Ivan Illich The Church, Change and Development Edited by Fred Eychaner URBAN TRAINING CENTER PRESS * HERDER AND HERDERCONTENTS Introduction Preface Author's Note Section I The Church, Change and Development The Seamy Side of Charity Dear Father Kevane Dear Mary: Letter to an American Volunteer Yankee, Go Home: The American Do-Gooder in South Ametica Between Jail and Campus: The Chaplain’s Halfway House The Vanishing Clergyman Section IT Mission and Midwifery Part 1; Missionary Formation Based on Missiology Part II: Selection and Formation of the Missioner Missionary Poverty Missionary Silence 54 él 98 112 120INTRODUCTION The time has arrived for someone to bring together a thematic collection of Ivan Ilich’s speeches, unpublished manuscripts, letters and articles, and it is appropriate that the Urban Training Center do so. For the past several years, people at the two centers, Cuernavaca and igo, have each worked at defining the problems of Christian ministry in the contest of social action, and since 1967 this parallel research and tr i has been united = con mucho gusto — in twenty-four hour conversations every two or three months. Such are the themes of these writings, battled out in Chicago between Illich (invariably perched on a classroom table) and Center trainees and staff. Above all else, this book is the grateful response of friends to a friend. The papers span the “60s, reaching in one instance as far back as 1957, with the majority between 1965-69. They address the problems of the mission of the Church in a period of accelerating technological change: in relation to controversy and revolution- ary action, in the midst of community and national development — all major questions on the theological agenda of the decade. In each case Illich’s answer is against the mainstream. Illich stands apart from the dominant style of social action advocated by the churches: first, by insisting upon a clear distinction between Christian mission and any particular social program — no matter how close the two may appear to be. Second, by warning that the Church’s self-understanding (let alone her witness in the world) will come into grave peril if ever her unique mission on the one hand, and a program of action on the other hand, are simply identified one with the other. Thanks to the current idolatry of “relevance” often this is just what has happened. Many of the writings and pronouncements of Church-sponsored action programs of the mid-60s read like naive or dishonest bids for partisan support because of their failure to acknowledge this fundamental distinction. Small wonder the fat is in the fire now! Nor should anyone be surprised that the Church is undergoing a systematic public purgation of