August 01, 1989 by Carl W. Wilson

A Reference Document of the Worldwide Discipleship Association

Down through history organizations other than local congregations have served crucial purposes within the church of Jesus Christ. For many years the U.S. government did not recognize Protestant mission societies in the same terms as they did Catholic orders. Key organizations—Wycliffe Bible Translators, Campus Crusade for Christ and SIM International—are now so classified. Here is a new article for mission leaders on an important subject.

I. The Essential Purposes or Definition of Religious Orders A. Two Aspects of the Church: Local Stationary Churches and Movements of Religious Orders.

The church of Jesus Christ has always had two aspects of its functional organization. These have been likened to the two kinds of threads necessary for weaving a piece of cloth. There are the stationary threads on the loom and the moving threads on the spindle. Without both, the so-called warp and woof, there could be no cloth woven (see Ralph D. Winter and R. Pierce Beaver, The Warp and the Woof, Pasadena CA, William Carey Library). So God has two aspects of the church to make it grow. Dr. Winter has entitled these two forms sodalities (the voluntary orders) and modalities (the local congregations or churches). (In "Two Structures of God's Redemptive Mission" William Carey Library, Pasadena CA).

The more stationary aspect of the church (modalities) is made up of the local churches or parishes where there are pastors and people who gather in congregations for worship. These involve the majority of God's people and are what most people today think of as "the church." Such local congregations may associate in various connectional organizations and form denominations.

In these local churches children are born and grow up, but these children sometimes take their religion for granted because they have inherited it from their parents. Moreover the people in the local congregation must occupy themselves with the tasks of working for a living, establishing homes, educating their children, and pursuing other things that take much time and effort. Hence, they may lose their zeal and vision for God. Their fruitfulness is hindered like the seed growing up in thorns and thistle, as Jesus said; and errors of thought and unbelief may grow up in the church like tares in the wheat field (Matthew 13:1-30). Under these conditions the morality and ethical standards of the church, as well as the spiritual devotion to God, will decline.

B. Two Purposes of Religious Orders: Internal Renewal of the Churches and Missionary Outreach

For this reason God has always raised up another form of organization in the church which goes through the local bodies to exert a renewing influence on their religious life. These movements are made up of people who have a vision of the need in the local churches and for renewal in these regards. Such a new religious order is made up of volunteers who are willing to commit themselves to promotion of that particular emphasis. They must be dependent on the voluntary contributions of people who see the same need but who, because of family obligations or other reasons (such as less dedication), are not able or willing to become a full-time minister dedicated to renewal.

These religious movements usually begin recruiting mainly young lay people or a few clergy. These people are not involved deeply in employment commitments, big families, or other binding responsibilities. Because family obligations, property ownership, et al., tend to hinder dedication and the free movement and assignment of personnel, these groups tend to be committed to poverty, chastity and obedience. But those qualities are not the essence of the religious order; the essence is meeting a need in the local churches. The vows are adopted only to help the order function efficiently and witness to higher ethical values.

History has shown that those vows tend to be relinquished when the need that motivated the commitment to the order has begun to be met. When the need diminishes or when the leadership fails to maintain the original vision of meeting the need, the voluntary commitment will diminish; and the members of the order will tend to move back into a lifestyle like the members of the local churches. If they allow marriage and children are born, this requires stability and involvement in the local church, and that tendency is accentuated. At times the members of the order will rejoin the local churches, or the order may itself become a denomination of local churches with the prominent theme of its original emphasis. Hence, many denominations were born out of religious movements or orders. Only by extreme authoritarian discipline and unnatural requirements against property ownership and marriage can the order be maintained when the need diminishes or the vision dims.

There is one other reason religious orders have come into being. When there has become an awareness of the need of extending the church into new geographic areas, the local churches have again had to appeal for volunteers who do not have heavy obligations (property, work or family) or who are willing to give up the benefits of those obligations to extend the church into those new areas. Thus, an organization of a religious order (often called a Mission Board or Mission Agency) has to be formed to carry out this missionary need.

Historically, religious movements or orders have come into being to: (1) influence the local church to renew a needed emphasis in morals or ministry, and (2) carry out missionary expansion to plant churches in a new area. Both are essential for the life and vitality of local church worship and growth of "the church" as a whole. Thus the religious orders and the local churches make up the tapestry that God weaves in "the church." The term secular priests has been given to leaders in the local churches and regular priests for those in the religious orders. The term "regular" is used because the order is bound by regulations, and the term "secular" is used because the group is defined by a specific temporal location.

The two kinds of religious orders—those designed to bring renewal to the local churches or established denominations, and those designed for missionary expansion—have a distinct difference. The religious order for missionary expansion is usually motivated by the ecclesiastical leadership of the local churches or denomination to extend their influence and purposes. Hence, the missionary religious order tends to be under or at least friendly to the established leadership of the churches (modalities). But sacrifices will still have to be made by the volunteers because lay people in the local churches often have difficulty seeing the value of work elsewhere, while moving and maintaining people in foreign cultures is expensive and difficult.

The religious order designed to renew the local churches in a lost emphasis or in a new emphasis now needed because of changing conditions will possibly be resented or resisted by the ecclesiastical leadership of the local or denominational established churches. No one likes to admit they have failed to guide the churches correctly or that they themselves have gone astray. Only after the order has shown it is genuinely meeting a need will it be accepted and fully supported by the established churches and their leadership. After this is done it is often the case that leaders within the order may become leaders in the churches.

Religious orders for missionary expansion tend to grow and flourish when the national interests of the churches are expanded by the business community or by military expansion. Hence, they are most prevalent when the nation is young and growing in strength and vigor.

The religious orders for renewal are more likely to come into being when the national society is declining morally and spiritually or as the nation gets older. The religious orders and the local church structures have always been interrelated. The local church produces leaders for the orders, and in turn leaders from the orders will often become leaders of local churches. They are not mutually exclusive and are meant by God to interact and influence each other as two forms of His church as a whole. They both constitute the way He influences His people.

II. Documentation of This Description and Definition by a Historical Review of Religious Orders and Their Influence on the Church (This is not comprehensive but illustrative.)

A. The Old Testament

In the Hebrew Old Testament religion the local churches or congregations existed as well as religious orders for renewal. When the nation of Israel settled in Palestine the priesthood of Aaron's descendents (Exodus 28:1; 40: 12-15; Numbers 17; 18:1-8) were assigned locations to live, having cities distributed throughout the nation (Joshua 21:10-19). These priests traveled an area (parish) and taught the law of God to the people and sought to help the people apply that law to their daily life. On occasion these priests would go and serve with the high priests in the tabernacle of Shechem or the temple in Jerusalem (1 Chronicles 24:1-19; 2 Kings 11:5,9; Jos. Antiq. vii. 14,7). Thus the nation or theocracy was unified in the Hebrew religion by the local parish priests and their participation in and support of the centralized worship. This in turn formed the ethical basis for civil government. In the course of the moral decline of the people of Israel and the corruption of the spiritual life, God raised up a religious group (or order) known as the prophets. They formed into schools and traveled around preaching and ministering to people (1 Kings 18:10; 21:18; 2 Kings 4:8). Their chief burden was the fact that the church of God's people had departed from their love for God and devotion to obedience to His law. They sought to call the people back to the law of God. While the gift of prophecy existed from the beginning of God's people (Genesis 20:7; Deuteronomy 18:15-18; Judges 6:8; 1 Samuel 3:20; 2 Samuel 7:2), the religious orders of the prophets seem to have begun with Elijah and Elisha. Their disciples or understudies were called "the sons of the prophets" (2 Kings 2:3,5,17; 4:1,38; 5:22; 1 Kings 18:4; 19:1,10). During the decline of Israel and Judah some of these rose to great prominence and were spokesmen to the nations (Joel, Amos, Micah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, et al.). B. The New Testament These religious orders of the prophets ended with John the Baptist and his followers (Mal. 4:5; Luke 1:17; John 1:35; Matthew 14:3-12; Mark 6:16-29; Luke 3:17,20; Acts 19:3). John's religious order was not primarily a missionary one, but one to promote renewal as did the Old Testament prophets. Hence, he was questioned and opposed by the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem. His order did spread outside Palestine to the dispersed Jewish communities and was found in Alexandria, Ephesus, et al. During the intertestamental times the Jews were dispersed throughout the Mediterranean world. Some of them went out in proselytizing teams (Matthew 23: 15; Acts 2:10; 13:43) about which we know little. But the Jews formed synagogues in every community where they had a colony of people or could convert Gentiles (Matthew 12:9; 13:54; 18:20; Acts 9:20; 13:5,14; 14:1; 17:2,10; 18:4,19; 19:8, et al.). Ralph Winter suggests that these two Jewish structures, synagogues and proselytizing teams, were types followed by Jesus and His apostles (In Missiology: An International Review, 1974, "Two Structures of God's Redemptive Mission," pp. 121-123). The beginning of the New Testament church functioned more as a religious order than a church. Jesus began His teaching in Jerusalem and Judea and moved through Samaria to Galilee. Eventually He made a head- quarters in Capernaum from which He journeyed with His band of followers throughout Galilee into cities of the Gentiles, then to Transjordan, with several intermediate and a final journey to Judea and Jerusalem. He went through the synagogues (local churches) of Palestine with the new emphasis about His saving grace and turned the people away from the intense man-made legalism toward worshiping God in Spirit and truth. He also sent out His followers to travel and convert others (Matthew 10; Luke 10). His movement both renewed the local churches and acted as a missionary order in forming new congregations dedicated to Him. After Christ's crucifixion, burial, and resurrection, Jerusalem became the headquarters of the new movement. The followers went out from there through the synagogues making converts in Judea (Acts 9:32-43), Samaria (Acts 8), and Gentile countries (Acts 8:1; 11:19). The center of Gentile Christianity in Antioch of Syria delegated Paul, Barnabas, and Mark as a missionary team (Acts 13:1-3, et al.), thereby beginning apostolic orders that seem to have gone elsewhere (l Corinthians 9:5,6; Romans 15:19). These later divided into two teams (Acts 15:36-41). As the religious order of Christians expanded, they established local churches either in the synagogues or in house churches by calling those who believed to separate from the synagogue (Romans 16:5; Philemon 2; Acts 10: 33,44-48; 18:7, et al.). These were first established in Palestine and later in other nations as they expanded. But there seem to have always been the two forms of organiza- tion—the local church congregations and the traveling missionary teams (Acts 13:1-4; 15:36-41; 1 Corinthians 9:5,6). C. Religious Orders in Early Post-Apostolic Church Following the apostles' death the Christian church spread and became popular and prosperous in many places. It therefore became open to heretical groups—especially those inclined to be intellectual, syncretistic, or inclusive of pagan religions at points similar to Christianity (cf. Gnosticism). Even Orthodox Christianity became very intellectual, establishing catechetical schools, which the historian Philip Schaff called "Christian Gnostics." Because this did not meet the needs of the common man, the church also became more ceremonial and focused on the Eucharist. The morals of the Christian community declined. Toward the end of the second century a new order was formed of itinerant preachers, including women, claiming to have renewal of the gifts of prophecy and tongues. They were loosely organized but formed a definite community and sought to go through the churches to revive them. Kenneth Scott Latourette, speaking of this Montanist movement, says, "It stressed a high standard of Christian living among Christian communities into which laxity was beginning to creep" (A History of Christianity, Vol. 1, p. 129 ). This group lacked rigid discipline because of its emphasis on the Holy Spirit's leading. During this same period of declining morals other groups also formed (cf.ibid. p. 216 ). In the third and fourth centuries the church continued to decline in morals, especially after it was endorsed by the state under Emperor Constantine (313 A.D.). In that time the persecutions which were unleashed on the church impressed many to believe God was displeased with it. In Egypt the monastic orders were assisted by the climate in their withdrawal from the cities to live alone. Monks often were isolated and at times loosely held in fellowships living close to each other. The great monastic movement that became the model for later ones was started by a former military man, Pachomius, whose rules and discipline produced more than 3,000 followers by the time of his death. Because of the dangers of greed, sexual immorality and anarchy, they emphasized poverty, chastity and obedience. The vows did not call for complete poverty. As Latourette says, "Entrance to a monastery did not necessarily entail the renunciation of all the postulant's property, but he was to distribute at least part of it to the poor, taking care to do so with wisdom, remembering that he held it in trust from God" (ibid.., p. 230). These were mostly laymen at first who reacted to the low morality of the church (cf. ibid., p. 217). Monastic orders taking their cues from this spread throughout the East and West. Basil, influenced by Pachomius, had an influence on monasticism both in the East and West. He in turn influenced Benedict of Nursia of the 6th century whose order became widespread and to some extent the standard for religious orders. All of these were an effort to call men away from the excesses of greed and lust that even many of the bishops and church leaders demonstrated. They emphasized meditation and worship. They also emphasized the dignity of work, which rich clergy and the aristocracy belittled. Jerome later added the element of scholarship and education, as did Augustine and others. After the church leaders generally became corrupted with power and wealth, the monasteries, especially of the Benedictine order, were models of far more pure, meaningful, and holy living in the midst of a world of degradation. In time many of the monastic groups became attached to or controlled by the ecclesiastical authorities and became corrupted. By the middle of the tenth century monastic life was often in decay. "Recovery from the decline which Christianity had suffered in Western Europe between the years 500 and 950 found expression and was furthered through fresh monastic movements" (Latourette, ibid., p. 416). The need again for renewal motivated the growth of religious orders on into the twelfth century. The Cluny Movement, the Cistercian Movement, the Franciscans, the Dominicans and others were formed. In many ways these were similar to the earlier monastic movements, emphasizing poverty (in contrast to greed), chastity (in contrast to lust) and obedience (in contrast to lawlessness). None of these orders practiced those emphases consistently in the extremes (for example, poverty in which they owned nothing). But even in their modified form the living of those in the orders was generally in contrast to the world. The Dominicans and sometimes Franciscans sought to influence the youth in the universities and were often teachers there. As can be seen, most of the religious orders were the kind seeking to renew the church in the midst of declining moral values and low ethical standards. However, some of these orders also became useful tools of missionary outreach. After the Saxon warriors had devastated much of Celtic Christianity, Pope Gregory the Great needed a missionary force to undertake the evangelization and founding of churches in England. He asked Benedictine monks from the Mediterranean to go far to the north to a savage frontier to carry out this task, which they did, their leader eventually being known as Augustine of Canterbury. An even earlier example of missionary activity by an order was the Irish monks. They migrated throughout that land for the "love of God," "in order to win the heavenly fatherland," "for the love of the name of Christ." They also voyaged to the Orkneys, the Faroes, the rough coasts of Scotland, even to Iceland, to Germany, the hills of Gaul, the Alps, the valley of the Rhine and Danube, and remote places in Italy. There were many others. These and other missionary religious orders often went independent of the commission of the continental church movement. The vital importance of the interaction and interrelationship of the religious orders (sodalities) and the congregation-based church is evident. Dr. Winter says, "It is clear that the sodality, as it was recreated again and again by different leaders, was almost always the prime mover, the source of inspiration and renewal which overflowed into the papacy and created the reform movements which blessed diocesan Christianity from time to time, (" Two Structures of God's Redemptive Mission," op. cit., p. 129). One of the clearest evidences for this is the fact that some of the outstanding popes and bishops were monastic leaders. Some examples are Augustine of Hippo, Jerome, Thomas Aquinas, and Pope Gregory the Great (V) and Gregory theVII, et al. The Protestant Reformation did not involve just the formation of a religious order to deal with abuses, but involved a widespread rebellion within the churches themselves against leadership distortions and abuses. In a certain sense the religious orders had previously protested many of the abuses and distortions of religious truth that called the Reformation into being. For example, they had protested the selling of indulgences to finance Saint Peter's in Rome because of the triumph of worldly values and the love of money and glory by the clergy. But there were aspects of the Reformation that embodied the idea of a religious order. For instance, the Reformers printed and distributed their own literature and formed schools that trained young men to travel around preaching the Reformed views. Guillaume Farel was called the Elijah of the French Reformation. He and those he trained traveled far and wide preaching and evangelizing. It was he who met the traveling preacher John Calvin as he passed through Geneva and importuned him to stay there. Geneva became a center for training and sending speakers and missionaries everywhere. The Anabaptists were essentially a missionary order with the strong emphasis on believer baptism. They went everywhere converting people to their cause, but from their inception as a movement they organized local churches out of their converts from the churches of Switzerland and the lands to which they spread. Hence, from the beginning they resembled the early apostolic missionary groups of Jesus, Paul, and others of the New Testament. They used the form of a sodality to establish modalities. Latourette has pointed out that "for all intents and purposes the early band of highly evangelistic Methodist circuit riders adhered to characteristically Roman Catholic vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience" (Ralph Winter, “Protestant Mission Societies: The American Experience,”Missiology, An International Review, Pasadena, California, p. 139). Thus all the early beginnings of the Presbyterian, Baptist, and Methodist churches incorporated some aspects of the religious order. But in the early days of the Reformation, the leadership was generally hostile to all things Roman, and specifically the orders of monks in the Roman Catholic Church, which at that time had extensively given up their renewing function. Most of the more moderate Reformers wanted to change the church from within, while the more extreme groups formed new structures that often became heretical. Hence, the major Reformation emphasis looked askance at new groups of religious orders. The Moravians, which for many years functioned as a missionary order, gradually eased up and became a denomination. It was not until William Carey advanced the idea of forming independent mission boards to evangelize the heathen that the Protestant churches produced a large number of mission agencies similar to the religious orders of the Roman Catholics (William Carey, An Enquiry into the Obligation of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathens, ca. 1787).

III. A Comparison Of Roman Catholic And Protestant Orders Ralph D. Winter, as the outgoing president in 1979 of the American Society of Missiology, addressed that organization demonstrating "the Protestant Missionary Society as a parallel to the Roman Catholic Order" ("The American Experience," op. cit., p. 139). Since Dr. Winter spoke for that body, which is an organization representing essentially all the major denominational church groups in America—Roman Catholic, Historic Protestant, and Evangelical—his state- ments represent a significant definition of what the Protestant equivalent is to the Roman Catholic religious order. He argues that the Protestant churches would be more healthy if they learned from the longer Catholic experience. He argues that "the Roman Catholic tradition [in regard to orders]...embodies a superior structural approach to both renewal and mission" (italics mine to show the two purposes of a religious order). He says, "Protestants must begin to see their parachurch structures in a similar light. That is, they can better understand how best to fulfill their own profound obligation to unity, renewal and mission if they see their own forms in cooperative reference to those of the Roman Catholic tradition" (ibid., p. 141 ). What Catholics call orders and religious societies, Protestant historians have called voluntary societies" (ibid., p. 143 ). Dr. Winter then gives four models as to how voluntary religious societies may relate to a religious church or denomination: Type A, Denomination administered and funded. Type B, Denomination administered, but funded by direct, designated giving. Type C, Denomination-related but autonomous. Type D, Related to many denominations. Dr. Winter has compared the two traditions (Roman Catholic and Protestant) as to commitment. He says, "What about poverty, chastity, obedience? The acceptance of 'poverty' as a lifestyle has characterized virtually every Protestant mission society, as has functional chastity of a sort we have just mentioned [in relating how Protestant missionaries made cohabiting with their wives secondary to their ministry]. But chastity is as much an attitude as anything else. Obedience? Until recent times, becoming a Protestant missionary was as permanent a call as any solemn vow in the Roman tradition" (ibid., p. 148. ). Later he argues, "On the other hand, the concept of poverty may by now by many Protestant structures be taken as seriously as (or perhaps even more seriously than) by many Catholic orders." Dr. Winter refers to a checklist Gannon (1977) gave on Catholic orders and points out that Gannon refers to "common property" rather than to "poverty" as a significant trait and adds, "However, Protestant missions do plan for poverty, so to speak. It is almost universal among Protestant missions for all field personnel under any given agency, whether medical doctors, teachers or whoever, to receive modest identical allotments once the cost-of-living and national exchange-note adjustments have been made. ...On the other hand, among Protestants little thought is given to poverty as a specific spiritual virtue. The actual parity and comparative austerity of allotment is more likely the result of pragmatic, situational considerations—'making the money go further"' (ibid., pp. 163,164). The above review of religious orders shows that vows were means to the ends of either renewing the church or extending its missionary efforts. The vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience were in contrast to the greed, lust, and anarchy in the society. In the Roman tradition they were understood to be possible only for singles or married couples without children who could be more mobile and could accomplish the ends with less cost. Moreover, the history of most of the Catholic orders shows that the degree of commitment to those vows varied greatly through the process of time and conditions. Dr. Winter points out that the essential dedication required by these vows as a rebuke to the world's conduct and in order to carry out the religious orders' purposes have been and are as great or greater in Protestant societies. Therefore the issue is not whether Protestants employ the words of the traditional vows, but whether they render the same commitment in order to make the religious order effective in promoting renewal and/or missionary outreach. That alone should define what is essential to the qualifications as an order. For the Protestant it is very important to see that the vows were made to counteract the degrading of morals through greed (poverty), lust (chastity) and lawlessness (obedience). And if it were a missionary order, these were necessary sacrifices in order to be mobile and effective in carrying out the work. While the initial stages of most Roman Catholic orders had good renewing effects on the church, the orders at times lost sight of the main reasons for the vows and therefore, while keeping the letter of the vow, violated their purpose. Some monastic groups became quite prosperous; and while the members themselves owned no property but held it in common, they lived far above the poor in the area where they resided. Hence, they ceased to be a force against greed. At one time the religious orders and clergy owned about one-fifth of the wealth of Germany which caused a profound reaction among the poor peasants. Also, at times, members of the orders remained unmarried, but were involved in sexual relations and even kept concubines. Again, instead of being a witness to the reform for which their group originated, they had a negative effect. In those times of monastic decay "obedience" was superficial, not true obedience to Christ, and did not restrict lawlessness, but promoted it. Among the monks there were times of quarrelling, violence and pride (for evidence on these things see Latourette, "Decay in Monastic Life," ibid., pp. 640ff ). Protestants have formed their religious orders with the same desires to counteract evil in the church and world and to sacrificially forward missions. But because of their return to a biblical motivation in these matters, their response has been different (as Dr. Winter showed). They saw the Christian as a steward of the material things God had given him and put a strong emphasis on laboring to gain material things so he could care for his family, give to the poor and extend the work of the kingdom of God. Hence this view of "stewardship of the material," being accountable to God for its use, prohibited him from endorsing the idea of poverty as a virtue in itself. This was especially true of those who held to Calvinistic theology. But as Dr. Winter has emphasized, Protestant religious orders have if anything often exhibited a greater willingness to sacrifice than their Roman Catholic counterpart in modern times. The Protestant reformers interpreted required celibacy of monks and clergy as contrary to the sanctity of marriage. Celibacy for clergy was not required in the Apostolic church (Matthew 8:14; 1 Corinthians 9:5). It became a dogma required of clergy only in the fifth century (see Latourette, op. cit., p. 224). Hence, the Reformers could not see this definition as a vow of virtue. But Protestant orders have strongly appealed to young men and women, and many have gone out as celibate singles to the mission fields or to work tirelessly for reform by evangelism and teaching. And as Dr. Winter says, "Married missionaries have often been willing to spend long periods of time away from spouse and children in order to accomplish their ministry" (cf. Winter, "The American Experience," op. cit., p. 148). Protestants also do not emphasize the Roman view of "obedience." Roman Catholic theology had seemed to teach that by doing “good works,” outwardly, for and through the church, one could earn merit with God. The most basic of all tenets of the Reformation was that man could be acceptable to God only by His grace to the sinner through faith. Faith or trust in God alone could make man acceptable. Moreover, the reformers saw faith as the key to the Christian life --"faith worketh by love" (Galatians 5:6) and "obedience of faith" (Romans 1:5) were their emphases. Therefore it is not by accident that many Protestant mission societies have called themselves "faith missions." Partly because the reformers saw the abuses of the vows, they failed to see the original purposes for the Catholic orders and rejected the usefulness of the orders along with the vows. In an appeal letter the Protestant organization Campus Crusade for Christ International has said: Martin Luther and other "protestors" denounced most of the practices within the church that did not have a Biblical precedent. Any tradition that was not specifically mentioned in the New Testament became suspect and the monasteries, which certainly lacked a Biblical precedent, fell under attack. In his treatise De votis, Luther attacked orders on the grounds that the vows which members took were "contrary to the Word of God," "contrary to faith,", "to evangelical liberty," "to the commandments of God" and "contrary to reason" (Francois Biot, O.P., The Rise of Protestant Monasticism, Baltimore: Helicon Press, 1963, 14-26). The vows to which he refers are those traditionally associated with religious orders: the vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience. These vows are three of the fifteen characteristics which define a religious order. Luther contended that the vows and monastic life in general "implies a recognition of a source of holiness...other than Christ for reaching salvation--that is, keeping the vows, keeping the rule, etc." (ibid., p. 26). Calvin did not expend as much energy denouncing orders, but in the references he did make, he sided with Luther's position (ibid. , pp. 33-45). It is important therefore to take into account the mixed historical role of the Roman vows of "poverty, chastity, and obedience" and recognize the different emphasis in the Protestant orders to achieve the same goals, as Dr. Winter has pointed out. It should further be noted that the motive of many Protestant religious orders is to change the life and ministry of the local churches or denominations (modalities); therefore, they often seek to avoid certain forms of ministry that might threaten the clergy of the modalities and that would hinder their influence on them. Because the modalities or local churches are perpetuated largely through family life and the rearing of children, the religious orders tend to leave the ministry of performing marriages, baptism of children, etc., to the secular clergy of the churches. This allows the regular clergy, or ministers of the orders, to have greater interaction and influence on the churches without conflict of interest with the local church or secular clergy. Hence, the religious orders often talk more about "commissioning" their ministers rather than "ordaining" them. But they work equally hard at ministering for God in evangelizing, teaching the Word, counseling and the like. Furthermore, the orders have always been known to have extensive, systematic training for their commissioned members. The theological seminary tradition, in fact, in both Roman Catholic and Protestant traditions has been essentially borrowed from the order traditions. Dr. Winter has pointed out that the Protestant orders have varying relationships to the denominational churches and often do not come directly under their control. Hence, for the Protestant orders to have the best relationship with local churches, it is disadvantageous and unnecessary for their ministers to perform identical clerical functions. During recent wars of the United States, most local draft boards recognized the full-time ministry status of those serving in religious orders (regular clergy) and granted them exemption from armed service as they did for the ordained pastoral clergy of the churches. The Roman Catholic scholar Thomas M. Gannon gave the following list of characteristics in his chapter "Catholic Religious Orders in Sociological Perspective; they are here restated so that it may be clear that they apply to either Roman Catholic or Protestant societies (see Ralph Winter's listing of Gannon's points in "The American Experience," op. cit., pp. 162,163). Our listing corresponds with Gannon's, except as noted, and with obvious rewording to fit Protestant views.

IV. Summary: Characteristics of a Legitimate Religious Order 1. It exists to carry out one or possibly two purposes for the church: (Gannon lists this #2 "Response to a Challenge") a. Revival: To renew the moral and ethical character and conduct of people in the churches from a state of degeneration to the standard of the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. b. Missionary: To extend the gospel and whole teachings of Christ to new areas so new people become Christians and new churches are established and begin to grow. 2. Members make a commitment to the order (Gannon #l "Voluntary, Deeper Commitment") a. Voluntarily--The person volunteers of his own will to make the sacrifice to be in the order, a sacrifice not required of the local church member. b. Knowledgeably--He volunteers on the basis that he understands the need and how the order will meet that need, not on the basis of worldly approval or benefit. 3. Members recognize that their calling is from God and it requires a deep faith and personal devotional relationship to Him through prayer and Bible study and an active full-time involvement in the work of the ministry. (This may involve job descriptions.) 4. Organization into trained teams (or task forces) who are equipped to carry out the ministry. This involves: a. Trained, experienced leadership b. Adequate supervision c. Training for all members of the team. (This often involves manuals, materials, and audio-visual materials today.) 5. A distinctive spirit and type of ministry, giving organizational esprit de corps. 6. Highly structured selectivity and commitment for admission to the order and clear termination from membership. 7. Strong durability of purpose and existence. (The organization is not built on a passing fad or a charismatic personality.) 8. Stress on Christian truth, especially the basics for Christians. 9. A normative pattern of discipline or policy of government of the members within the order. 10. A community of members sharing life and ministry together. (Meeting together, sharIng the Lord's supper together, helping each other.) 11. A relationship to the churches (modalities), often semi-autonomous or autonomous - see Dr. Winter, "The American Experience," op. cit., pp. 150ff. 12. A defined structure of authority, usually quasi-familial. 13. Commitment to dependence on God for material needs and to a sacrificial level of living on a parity with other members. They live off of allotments or salaries which are equivalent according to evaluation of their needs (e.g., more if they have more children). 14. A commitment to sexual purity (virginity for singles and monogamy in marriage) and a willingness to make sexual relationships secondary to the Kingdom of God. 15. Willingness to live a life of faith in God and obedience to Him and His leadership through Scripture. 16. A commitment to honesty and integrity before God and toward others in the order.