Special Hearings — Faith Community Hearings — 1997-11-17

DAVID WANLESS: Chairperson, Ndade, I present the submission of the United   Congregational Church which was prepared by our Secretary Designate, Rev. Des   van der Walt and Dr Steve de Guchi. I'm also very grateful that Professor John   de Guchi is here to assist me where my faith falls short. In case I overrun,   let me begin with the end, if I may Sir, and say what our confession is. Like   many of the other churches today, with the benefit of hindsight we need to be   honest with ourselves and with the country and confess that for all our statements,   sermons and letters and reports about the evils of apartheid, we really did   so little to rid our beloved land of its tyranny. We did so little to bind up   the wounds of those who were victims of the system and to labour with them for   justice. We so often relied on the one or two who were willing to stick their   necks out and as a people we were scared and anxious to be bold and prophet   witness. And so we apologise to those whom we abandoned in their difficult plight   and to the nation for failing in our moral responsibility.
We knew all along that hideous things were happening, and that is often why   we said what we said, and did what we did. We recognise that what is being revealed   by your commission will have a profound impact on future generations in the   country. There are sins to be forgiven, wounds to be bound up, hatreds to be   reconciled, buildings to be re-built, pupils to be taught, leaders to be held   accountable and this is the task of the church of Jesus Christ. And although   we are a small church with few resources, we acknowledge this calling and commit   ourselves to nurturing this truth, healing the nation and building a culture   of tolerance and justice, so that our children and their children may never   again suffer the evil which has so plagued the life of our nation. How, Sir,   did we get there? We are numbered among the English speaking churches, although   I think the predominant language in our church is Afrikaans, probably the second   most common language in our church is Zulu, followed by Tswana. But we prepare   to celebrate 200 years of congregationalism in South Africa in 1999, when we   mark the arrival of the first London Missionary Society missionaries in Cape   Town. And although one can criticise the strategy and actions of many of the   missionaries in our country that came from overseas, I think they all understood   something of what Dr John Phillip, the first supervisory representative of the   LMS meant when he said, "If a minister is guilty of dereliction of his   duty and advocating the cause of the oppressed or in relieving the necessities   of the destitute, I plead guilty to that charge". And I think many of our   ministers in the United Congregational Church would echo those words of Phillip.   Phillip was the precursor of a long line of missionary heroes, such as Robert   Moffat, Newton Adams after whom Adams College was named, Alden Grout after whom   the town of Kwa Zulu Natal was named, David Livingstone, John MacAud, and in   our time, of our own memory, the Reverend Joseph Wing whose statements form   a large part of our submission.
We are glad to number among the congregational heroes of our faith many prominent   people. In fact it was the first president of the ANC, the congregational minister   Reverend John Dube who helped to address the questions then arising in 1912,   and he then, even then, charged that christianity had an offensive smell to   a large number of natives, as people of colour were then known. And with the   greatest love and respect for you, Sir, and your achievements as a Nobel Peace   Prize winner, we are proud to claim that the first Nobel Peace Prize winner   was a Congregationalist, Chief Albert Luthuli, and this year [APPLAUSE] when   the church established a Roll of Honour, his was the first name to be enrolled.   But like many of the other denominations that have been present here, Sir, we   must acknowledge that although resolutions were taken at Executive Assembly   level and statements issued by our Secretariat after hours of debating, these   were very often the positions of the leadership, and they were not embraced   by the average occupant of the pew in the white churches of our denomination.   I recall a time when I was a minister in Uitenhage and you, Sir, had done something   that had particularly offended the authorities of the day and I said from the   pulpit that the day would come when people of South Africa would be grateful   for people like Bishop Tutu and later in that week I was visited by two of my   deacons, who advised me against making such inflammatory statements from the   pulpit. But I praise you for your consistency, Sir, because when you advised   or called upon the ANC to suspend the armed struggle, you were then the flavour   of the month in Uitenhage and I could smile in the pulpit once again.
But from the beginning we took the position that apartheid was not simply wrong   and evil in terms of its results, but of itself, and we were early in the decision   after the Presbyterians, to embrace the Ottowa Declaration that apartheid is   a sin and its theological justification a hierarchy. And for those from the   reformed tradition to label anything a hierarchy in the calvanist understanding   of it, gives you some idea of how earnestly we took the opposition to apartheid.   Like many of the other churches we were a trans-natioanl church and some of   the victims of apartheid were in neighbouring countries. Our church life in   Mozambique was devastated by the civil war initiated by Renamo. Zimbabwe suffered   terribly through a civil war in which the white minority government of Ian Smith   received moral support from the apartheid regime. Namibia was held as a vassal   state and Botswana suffered greatly from cross border raids. Besides the violence   and destruction of a policy, our churches suffered. Our church in Graaff Reinet   was just one example to which I will refer later, of many congregations that   had to be uprooted. And Joe Wing, our General Secretary for the first 20 years   of our life, said in 1987 that it is the ultimate ...[indistinct] to designate   God's green and brown earth as black or coloured or white land. We lost many   of our institutions, like Tiger Kloof, which count among their illumine the   first two presidents of Botswana, and we share with the pain of other churches   in the trauma of the closing of the Federal Theological Seminary which still   resounds on our church life today.
The advent of the tricameral parliamentary system was particularly hurtful   for the Congregational Church, Sir. Two of our ministers, former chairman in   fact, the Reverend Allan Hendrikse and Andrew Julies, led the Labour Party into   accepting rolls in the House of Representatives. But the UCCSA Assembly moved   swiftly to distance itself from that and in fact that difficulty persists. Just   this very year, two months ago, the Assembly had to resolve that in the interim,   until we can do it constitutionally, ministers of the UCCSA should not contest   elections or accept political appointments at any level. The opposition to the   apartheid regime and particularly something that has already been touched on,   the programme to combat racism, we never in the UCCSA questioned the rightness   of that, even though it cost us our mother church, the Union Church in Kloof   Street, which left the United Congregational Church because of our support of   this programme to combat racism. And that schism still remains and is hurtful   to many in our denomination today. We encouraged our ministers to oppose the   Mixed Marriages Act and encouraged the registration of children without reference   to their racial classification. The Congregational Church has a long tradition   of passivism and so from the start, it was in the forefront of its opposition   to conscription and support for the End Conscription Campaign. The UCSA was   the only church to make a clear and unambiguous stand in favour of the Kyros   Document which was produced amidst the horror of the 1985 State of Emergency.   And throughout we have remained mindful of the fact that we had to challenge   the laws and policies of apartheid, while at the same time trying to minister   to its victims. 
And so, we must admit Sir, with the other churches, that it is to our shame   that the UCCSA in many places mirrored the apartheid society of the church.   We are not unmindful of the fact that there was something hypocritical about   condemning apartheid in the State and yet being a racially divided church in   ourselves. Resolution after resolution was passed, church programmes were introduced   to enable black, white and coloured member churches to be integrated, but with   little success. Even attempts to move ministers and to cross cultural and racial   settings were not produced with vigour. If I may end, Sir, by going back to   the reference I made to the Graaff Reinet church. In 1993 the UCCSA held its   Assembly in Graaff Reinet, and after that I wrote and broadcast on the SABC   and subsequently incorporated into a book of meditations that I published on   behalf of my local church, during which we had this to say 
"During October 1993, in Graaff Reinet, we met to consider the affairs   of the church, and the one irony that we could not escape was the fact that   we were meeting in the Parsonage Street Congregational Church, which is no longer   situated in Parsonage Street. You see, some twenty odd years ago, the authorities   of the day decided that the good christian folk of that church were of the wrong   racial group to be worshipping slap bang in the middle of the white part of   town. They were forced to leave the historic old church building which is today   used as a theatre. And they had to move under the Group Areas Act to the more   politically acceptable coloured part of town.." 
And this story can be repeated a thousand times over in South Africa. The challenge   facing this committee and our country in the future is how we go about unscrambling   our segregationist omlet and we don't know how to do it. We don't know yet fully   how to go about restoring justness and wholeness to this land, ravaged for so   long by the false gods of race and creed. Not many white South Africans feel   particularly responsible for the collective sins of our apartheid past, but   each of us, of whatever race group who have been part of the privileged class,   have made individual slights or hurts for which we do need to feel utter regret.   Even after showing our repentance by some form of righting past wrongs, many   of us will still go on making the same racial mistakes. How will we repair the   damage? Listen to God speaking to the Old Testament Prophet Joel "I will   restore the years that the locust has eaten and you shall eat your fill".   And then note what St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians "From the first to   the last, this has been the work of God. He has reconciled himself to us through   Jesus Christ." 
And so to end Sir, I suggest that the way forward for every individual and   for the nation as a whole is to allow God, who has broken down the dividing   walls in Jesus Christ, is to come into our lives, our personal decisions, our   national choices. To enable the process of reconciliation and of new beginnings   to happen. He has welcomed us back to God's side, and Christ wants to restore   the years that the locust has eaten, and I wrote, "So, Reverend Hufkey   and your congregation in Graaff Reinet, this is my personal sorry to you and   to all the others who have been hurt by actions like mine. I know you find it   hard still to walk along Parsonage Street, past the lovely old building. I hope   that one day soon, you will be able to worship within its walls again. Until   that happens, let us join together with Christ in forgiving all that we must,   in repairing what we can and go to the future in the confident hope that the   scars will heal and that there will be singing when we are all, praise God Almighty,   free at last ! 
Thank you Sir.