{"id":68752,"date":"2024-11-20T17:34:29","date_gmt":"2024-11-20T22:34:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=68752"},"modified":"2024-11-20T17:34:29","modified_gmt":"2024-11-20T22:34:29","slug":"rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/","title":{"rendered":"RIP Tony Campolo (1935-2024)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Evangelist Tony Campolo died today at the age of 89<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s Friday, but Sunday\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n

Tony was one of my favorite preachers and one of my favorite college professors.<\/p>\n

He was also a mentor. I volunteered in after-school tutoring programs he ran in Philadelphia. I wrote scripts for his radio commentaries back in the \u201990s. And I was his teammate on the alumni squad in Eastern\u2019s intramural basketball league. The man had a smooth two-hand set-shot.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m both saddened by Tony Campolo\u2019s death and encouraged by his life and I will need to say more about what he taught me, and taught all of us, at greater length later.<\/p>\n

For more than a decade, I had a front-row seat to the world of \u201cprogressive evangelicalism\u201d \u2014 the Ron (Sider) and Jim (Wallis) and Tony Show. But as I wrote here recently, unlike Ron and Jim, Tony was never really a white evangelical<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Tony Campolo [was] a missionary sent<\/em>\u00a0to<\/em>\u00a0white evangelicals. He was ordained as an associate pastor at Mount Carmel Baptist Church, a historic Black Baptist church in West Philadelphia. That\u2019s where he was converted and discipled. And that is where he learned his hermeneutics \u2014 where he learned how to read and understand the Bible.<\/p>\n

Mount Carmel is also where Tony learned to preach. The difference between Black church preaching and white evangelical preaching is \u201ccultural,\u201d but not in the reductive way that\u2019s usually understood. The biggest \u201ccultural\u201d difference in those styles of preaching is\u00a0hermeneutical<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 a very different way of reading and approaching and understanding and invoking the Bible. I\u2019ve heard Tony preach more than 100 times and never once did I hear him attempt to quantify the preponderance of the biblical data.<\/p>\n

So again, Tony Campolo is an indigenous missionary, a white guy commissioned by Black Christians to go and dwell among white evangelicals, preaching the gospel to us so that we might hear and repent and be saved.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Tony was, among other things, a master story-teller. So here I\u2019ll re-post a bit from one of his favorites: \u201cI Fired Them Deacons<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tony got the story from Clarence Jordan, founder of Koinonia Farms and thus, later, of Habitat for Humanity.<\/p>\n

\"\"In the 1950s, an old \u201chillbilly preacher\u201d invited Jordan to come and speak at his church in rural South Carolina. Jordan arrived to find, to his surprise, a large, thriving and racially integrated congregation \u2014 a remarkable thing in that time and place. (Sadly, it\u2019s actually a remarkable thing in\u00a0any<\/em>\u00a0time or place.) So Clarence asked the man how this came about.<\/p>\n

When he first got there as a substitute preacher, the old man said, it was a small, all-white congregation of a few dozen families. So he gave a sermon on the bit from Galatians where Paul writes: \u201cYou are all children of God \u2026 There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here I\u2019ll pick up from Tony Campolo\u2019s retelling of Jordan\u2019s story:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the service was over, the deacons took me in the back room and they told me they didn\u2019t want to hear that kind of preaching no more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clarence asked, \u201cWhat did you do then?\u201d<\/p>\n

The old preacher answered, \u201cI\u00a0fired<\/em>\u00a0them deacons!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow come they didn\u2019t fire you?\u201d asked Clarence.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, they never hired me,\u201d the old preacher responded. \u2026 \u201cOnce I found out what bothered them people, I preached the same message every Sunday. It didn\u2019t take much time before I had that church preached down to four.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tony and Jordan told that story as an illustration, generally, of the principle that the preaching congregations\u00a0need<\/em>\u00a0to hear is often the very preaching that those congregations don\u2019t\u00a0want<\/em>\u00a0to hear. And they both told it, more specifically, to point out that what most white congregations don\u2019t want but very much need to hear is preaching that condemns white supremacy. They both held up the success of this \u201chillbilly preacher\u201d as an example of the kind of church growth and fruit-bearing ministry that can come about only if churches are willing to tackle \u201cwhat bothered them\u201d \u2014 i.e., the sin of white supremacy \u2014 head on.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s all very biblical stuff. Very\u00a0Isaiah 58<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 loose the bonds of injustice, break every chain and set free the oppressed and \u201cThen your light shall break forth like the dawn,\u00a0<\/span>and your healing shall spring up quickly \u2026\u00a0<\/span><\/span>and you shall be like a watered garden,\u00a0<\/span>like a spring of water,\u00a0<\/span><\/span>whose waters never fail.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;\u00a0<\/span>you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;\u00a0<\/span><\/span>you shall be called the repairer of the breach,\u00a0<\/span>the restorer of streets to live in.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I like to think that\u2019s all true \u2014 that good moral advice will also be good practical advice for church leaders seeking to have growing, thriving congregations. Alas, I\u2019m not entirely hopeful that it always works out so neatly. Sometimes, as in the case of this hillbilly preacher\u2019s success, doing the right thing will lead to greater success. Other times, I\u2019m afraid, virtue will need to be its own reward because it will be its only reward.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s Friday, but Sunday’s coming.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":68746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-68752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nRIP Tony Campolo (1935-2024)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It's Friday, but Sunday's coming.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"RIP Tony Campolo (1935-2024)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It's Friday, but Sunday's coming.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"slacktivist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-11-20T22:34:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/52\/2021\/01\/Story.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"227\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"350\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/\",\"name\":\"RIP Tony Campolo (1935-2024)\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2024-11-20T22:34:29+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-11-20T22:34:29+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\"},\"description\":\"It's Friday, but Sunday's coming.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/11\/20\/rip-tony-campolo-1935-2024\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"RIP Tony Campolo (1935-2024)\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\",\"name\":\"slacktivist\",\"description\":\""Test everything; hold fast to what is good."\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\",\"name\":\"Fred Clark\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"caption\":\"Fred Clark\"},\"description\":\"Fred Clark is a graduate of Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary (now called Palmer Seminary), of Eastern College (now called Eastern University) and of the fundamentalist Timothy Christian High School (still fundamentalist and still called Timothy Christian High School, but not really thrilled to have a snarky, liberal, tree-hugging, pro-choice, pro-GLBT, peacenik, commie, evolutionist as such a vocal alumnus). A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}