M V Tronson says that he, like many others, have been dismayed at how the Christian Right and the Christian Left are singing off the same hymn sheet through adversity. He for one is crying out, 'Is there a moderate's lobby speaking outside their own domains' at all?'
History records that in adversity views become polarised and this was no more evident than in the 1920's in Germany where the Right was represented by the National Socialists and the Left was represented by the Communists. The moderates seemed not to have had an influential voice.
The Christian churches too in the seventies moved towards polarisation. The poverty and injustice of the third world bought a wave of Christian action (Liberation Theology) that was deemed as Leftist views while a decade later in the US the Christian Right pursued political influence.
"Today so much of the Christian media representing various theological leanings also give every appearance to be in line with views that reflect the Left or the Right, while the moderates without any dramatic news headlines of their own, are increasingly becoming marginalsied," M V Tronson muses.
He cites Australian Christian commentators who are so far to the Right they appear to be against almost everything, and to the Left who are against almost nothing. "I'd find living in the sort of Christian world of the Right likened to a Christian Taliban existence, and to the Left in a world where Christian values get exchanged for destructive idealism in tolerating everything," M V Tronson noted.
So where, for the most part, have the moderate 'commentators' disappeared too? asks M V Tronson in distress. The moderates he says, are cautious by nature and have seen too many of their own kind, who put their head over the proverbial parapet, only to have it shot off by the more politically savvy.
"It is said that church politics is deadly, for it is here that the great issues of life are proclaimed," M V Tronson explained.
There are now ministries devoted to the walking wounded from Church politics. Australia's John Mark Ministries founded by the Reverend Dr Rowland Croucher (http://jmm.aaa.net.au) and, in the USA, Pooped Pastors founded by Rev Dr Stephen Brown (http://test.poopedpastors.org) are both very significant.
It's undisputed, the leadership within the Uniting Church in Australia has shown strategic brilliance. Their opponents in relation to issues such as homosexuality have not developed as much political savvy.
At another level, the Southern Baptists of the United States and the broader Baptist World Alliance separation was that the BWA demanded a wider representation for key positions across the many departments.
The Pentecostal scene in Australia has developed a church politic that does not permit the antagonist layman to engage in any decision making. The Senior Pastor is the manager in ever aspect of church life.
"So where do the moderates fit in?" M V Tronson cries out.