A Sociological Study Of The Great Commandment In Pentecostalism

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Book Reviews / Pneuma 33 (2011) 109-169

Matthew T. Lee & Margaret M. Poloma, A Sociological Study of the Great Commandment in Pentecostalism (Lewiston, Queenston, Lampeter: Te Edwin Mellen Press, 2009). vi + 175 pp., hardback.

Sociology and theology are academic disciplines that can be likened to two distant and estranged family relatives who rarely encounter each other, let alone converse on matters of mutual interests which may offer a basis for dialogue and scholarly advancement. Hence, any endeavour to bring them both together is to be welcomed. Tis Lee and Poloma attempt to do in A Sociological Study of the Great Commission in Pentecostalism. Te project is not without its challenges and problematic aspects, a dimension not lost on the authors, in what constitutes a courageous and earnest enterprise.

Te volume results partially from the findings of the Godly Love Project based at the Institute for Research on Unlimited Love, founded in Cleveland, Ohio, in 2001. It consti- tutes the second major publication flowing from the project, the other being the well- received book Blood and Fire: Godly Love in a Pentecostal Emerging Church (New York University Press, 2008), derived from a four-year ethnographic survey and interviews con- ducted of members of a single congregation. A Sociological Study of the Great Commission in Pentecostalism raises some of the same complex theoretical and methodological issues, yet ranges wider than the earlier publication in engaging with the relationship between God’s power and the believer, and how the resultant altruism is manifest via mission and social behaviour. It is structured around the theme of Christian “Godly Love,” albeit still limited to the Pentecostal tradition. What is meant here is the interaction between divine and human love. It is, in short, the outcome of encountering the experience of a loving God and subsequently “being motivated by this dynamic to engage in selfless service to others.” Tis constitutes “Te Great Commandment in Pentecostalism” and, as their core aim, the authors examine such motivation in taking up the challenge.

An academic enquiry into this inspiration essentially means an exploration of the social science of “altruism” beyond evolutionary naturalism, social psychology, and other secular approaches, alongside embracing theological insights. Tis may at first, appear to be an audacious venture, but Poloma and Lee skilfully craft a justification for doing so, breaking not only new ground but some well-established taboos. Tese taboos, as the authors argue, are largely constructed by academia. I would also suggest that given the social science input — a point down-played in the volume — the endeavour probably breaks some cherished taboos of a fair few Pentecostals as well.

Te first part of the book engages with a justification for the project and advances to consider the thorny problem of theoretical approaches. Here Lee and Poloma jettison the much beloved sociological orthodoxy of “methodological agnosticism,” first conceived by Peter Berger, in order to embrace a “methodological theism” that is deemed to be essential not only to the project, but opens up the dialogue between theology and sociology. Te authors proceed by trawling through the multitude of key extant psychological (including naturalistic and Jungian theory) as well as sociological (including social network and social capital theories) work on unbridled spiritual altruism, abandoning some and embracing others in order to work-up a viable model of behavioralism as applied to the subject at hand. While I cannot agree with all the foundational aspect of the model (there is not the

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2011 DOI: 10.1163/157007411X554884

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Book Reviews / Pneuma 33 (2011) 109-169

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scope to detail them here), it constitutes an admirable undertaking in establishing a testable hypothesis and typology. Te key element involved is the subjective experience of the divine as the principal motivation behind Christian service, hence unadulterated altruism. Te authors then proceed to define love in this context by utilizing Sorokin’s five dimensions of love, while rightly recognizing that no definition can ultimately be essentialized or stripped of its variation-producing cultural relations.

Te sample frame based upon 110 interviews, suitably represented by geographical region, denomination and other variables, is solely comprised of Pentecostal ‘exemplars’ in Godly Love. A critical point that can be made here, given that at least a component of the sample frame was achieved by ‘snowballing’, is that it is not entirely representative. How- ever, the authors are to their credit acutely aware of such methodological difficulties and register reasons for inconsistencies and unexpected findings, while the sample remains suf- ficiently large as to reach meaningful conclusions. Nonetheless, before leaving the findings in respect of the demographic background of the interviewees, I found it striking that a large percentage were of a relatively high social class background as measured by profes- sional, educational qualifications and income. I was left wondering where the Pentecostals of an earlier age had gone: “the wretched of the earth” — the poor, marginalised and dis- posed. I was struck too by the conservative leanings, in a political and ideological sense, of the majority of those interviews. Tus I left struggling with how this was reconciled with the social activist dimension of altruism. I would have welcomed a detailed comment in the volume in respect of this observation.

It might also be said that, in relating the findings of interviewees analysed in the second half of the volume, Lee and Poloma found what they set out to find: that altruism stems from subjective experiences of the Holy Spirit. Such teleological pitfalls, of course, have always been part of the sociological endeavour. Tis is not to devalue their aim. Tere are some very valid insights to be found in the volume, not least of all is the testimony to the remarkable self-sacrifice of Pentecostal men and women motivated by faith, a motivation that psychology, sociology and allied disciplines find it so difficult to come to terms with. Tat said, things can go horrible wrong as the debacle with Todd Bentley and the Florida Revival cogently exemplifies and it is good to see that this getting a mention. All in all, the volume is a good read. It answers a worthy number of questions and, importantly, raises a few more that the synthesis of sociology and theology can engage with through future dia- logue. Put succinctly, Lee and Poloma are making considerable advances in creating a fresh agenda for those of us who welcome the challenge.

Reviewed by Dr. Stephen J. Hunt, Reader in the Sociology of Religion University of the West of England Stephen3.Hunt@uwe.ac.uk

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