Maggi Dawn posted recently on various and sundry tacky Christian novelties. Well, the same people who brought you the wash away your sins soap also have this lovely borderline sacreligious product for sale...
Are the flavors of your last supper lingering too long? Freshen your palate with the miraculous breath-cleansing power of these Last Supper After Dinner Mints. Each
collectible, 3" x 1-1/4" x -1/2" (7.6 cm x 3.2 cm x 1.3 cm) tin contains one hundred mints that you can share with your apostles! Thirty-six shrink wrapped tins in each illustrated display box.
In the right circumstances, I could see these figuring into a humorous alt-worship service of some kind. Come to think of it, why does church have to be so solemn all the time? Why couldn't we cut loose a bit with a humorous service? Of course, there's no need to get stupid about it...
Andrew Jones links to an analysis of the emerging church and its critics by Dr Reg Codrington, a South African biblical scholar and theologian. It's an interesting article, as he read several emerging church books (two by Brian McLaren, others by Leonard Sweet, Shane Claiborne and Reggie McNeal) and followed it up by reading D. A. Carson's critique of the emerging church.
It's a fascinating look from someone not embroiled in the midst of the catfight, and it's well worth reading. One thing that's nice to see is that Codrington sees Brian McLaren in a neutral light - somewhat difficult from the middle of the "battlefield", and finds weaknesses in McLaren's writing without demonizing him as Carson does.
I haven't read any of Shane Claiborne's stuff yet, but Codrington's comments made me want to, so I guess that's another book on the reading pile...
It’s been a busy couple of weeks, what with the work trip to the UK a couple of weeks ago and then last week being occupied mostly by a not so fun medical procedure (nothing serious, and maybe more later - oh wait, no, sorry, I promised a friend I wouldn't - never mind).
The important event this past weekend was International Women’s Day on Saturday March 8. I’m not a big fan of special days or weeks or months for things (The International Day for Three-Legged Blind Dachshunds being a case in point), but this one is important.
In my opinion, the two most important Millennium Development Goals are Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women and Improve Maternal Health. The evidence from around the world shows that educating women has the largest positive effect on societal development. The effect is particularly evident in reproductive health, where sex education, and in particular birth control, always results in women having fewer babies, thereby stabilizing entire communities. Getting off the constant pregnancy/birth treadmill does wonders for not just the health of the women but the communities they live in, too. It's no big secret that the most godforsaken places on earth feature the highest birth rates and highest infant and maternal mortality rates.
Marking International Women’s Day, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour had this (among other things) to say:
“Many States appear to have simply ignored the commitments they have made. It is shameful that, in the 60th anniversary year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, fundamental rights are still not enjoyed by many women around the world.”
The leveling of the playing field needs to continue everywhere. Even in the enlightened West there is still a long way to go before women get a decent hold on what might be called equality. It’s a crying shame that one of the last bastions of male privilege remains "the church". Replace “States” with “Churches” in the previous quoted paragraph and you still wouldn’t be far wrong.
Kathy Escobar, a contributor to the Emerging Women blog, has a really great post about women finding their voice in the Emergent “conversation”. It’s apparently still a bit like trying to order two pints of lager and a packet of crisps in a crowded British pub where the barman doesn’t know you, but still, you have to start somewhere. In particular, she highlights these thoughts, and expands on them very well:
Number three strikes me as particularly important, because to too many people in power, power sharing is seen as a zero sum game, when in fact it isn’t. Acknowledging other smart people doesn’t make you less smart. It may make you feel less superior, but shouldn’t that be a good thing?
Well, it may be a day or two late, here’s to women the world round. You deserve more than a lousy single day anyway.
Some of you may gather from my critique of Rising from the Ashes in recent posts that I am not a fan of the emerging church (lower case, note) any more. This would be a wrong assumption. I think it has promise still, but I think that it is important to clarify the various strands of the emerging church and evaluate what has happened and where it is going.
The first distinction that must be made is that the ec is quite different in the US than most other places. Here, the ec is driven primarily (but not exclusively) by a post-fundamentalist, post-evangelical mindset. There's nothing wrong with that, per se, but it is important to bear in mind. The biggest gorilla on the block is of course Emergent (capital E) and Emergent Village. This is because it is home to the most successful Emergent author, and arguably the cornerstone of Emergent USA, namely Brian McLaren. Without his early books it's doubtful that Emergent would exist today.
And here's where the distinction needs to be made between actual church communities that identify as "emergent" and the organization "Emergent". Basically hundreds of people have started churches, or an offshoot of an existing denomination, or a church-within-a-church and become emergent practitioners. This is where the rubber meets the road, and is what I would call truly "emergent". Often, nobody told them what to do or how to do it. Informal communities of friends and like-minded people found each other (often online) and shared what worked.
Emergent, the organization, is a different animal. It's a para-church organization that ostensibly exists to facilitate the "conversation" between practitioners. Emergent Village describes itself as:
"Emergent Village is a growing, generative friendship among missional Christians seeking to love our world in the Spirit of Jesus Christ."
This is where I see Tony Jones' comments about mainline churches needing to be redeemed or overthrown to be profoundly unfriendly, unloving and unhelpful. As the official paid spokesperson for Emergent Village this is quite unacceptable. It is interesting that many successful emergent churches in the UK are actually the church-within-a-church model, created and run with the blessing of the mainline denominations they belong to. Add to that the fact that one of the most successful emergent churches in Seattle is a Lutheran/Episcopal church plant, I think it's unfair to write off the mainline/emergent angle.
Far from being a help to practitioners, EV seems to be positioning itself as primarily an event and book promoter. Not only that, but there is a certain gate-keeping element to EV's self-proclaimed role that is rapidly becoming unhelpful. EV is potentially great for the writing and speaking careers of those it endorses, but does little to help the actual people doing the work of church in emerging contexts.
The great promise of emergent, I believed, was to marry the entrepreneurial spirit of emergent practitioners (and yes, that Evangelical background drives a lot of that entrepreneurship), with the stability and history of the mainline churches. This is where Presbymergent and Anglimergent are interesting experiments. Without the baggage of being post-evangelicals (for the most part) it will be interesting to see where these emergent-mainline communities can go, and what kind of influence they can have on their respective mainline behemoths.
Random, rootless church planting often leads to nothing but a cult of personality worship (see, for instance, Mark Driscoll's Mars Hill in Seattle), with no accountability and no connection to a historical faith. There is also no doubt that the mainline denominations desperately need a shot in the arm of some kind. Combining the best of both could be wonderful thing.
A week or so ago, Julie Clawson posted a lengthy comment on my second post on Becky Garrison's Rising from the Ashes book. Some of her points merit a follow up.
I find it rather interesting that you fault the emerging church for being a boys club and then harp on about masculinity and testosterone and then rip on the first book about the emerging church by a women(sic) that featured the perspectives of women.
So are you saying that just because it's written by a woman it shouldn't be held to the same standards as other books? The fact that it was "written" (see my first post for what I thought about the format and content) by a woman is completely immaterial. Is it really the first EC book by a woman? Wouldn't Phyllis Tickle count? Diana Butler-Bass? Both interviewed in the book. What about Anne Lamott - revered by EC folk everywhere?
Just to summarize my main beefs with the book:
I liked Rising from the Ashes and think it deserves a better treatment than reducing it to a two page interview with a guy you obviously don't like. I disagreed with a few of the perspectives in the book as well, but was able to appreciate the book for what it was nonetheless.
You obviously didn't read my review of the book as a whole in the aforementioned first post. The Tony Jones interview was merely a follow up on the most egregious content.
My mention of a
less than stellar one and half page interview with Tony Jones in Rising from
the Ashes: Rethinking Church prompted Tony to comment that he was attempting to be honest rather than
masculine. Well, I had to think about that for a while, as I’m not sure where
the honesty comes in, especially as two of the questions Tony answers point to
the fact that e/Emergent is more than willing to call other people out, but
unwilling to answer the tough questions themselves.
He picks on
Anglicans (interesting that he’d use the term Anglican rather than Episcopalian
– is this a shot at the Church of England, or the Episcopal Church? Or both?)
of which I am one. Now, one could argue that in what I have written below that I’m just being defensive. On the
other hand, the Anglican Communion as whole is dealing on a global scale with two of the biggest socio-political issues right now that face the church – i.e. what is the role in
the church of women and of gay Christians? It’s really messy, but there doesn’t
seem to be any way to manage the process other than to let it play out and see
where the pieces fall. These are two issues that e/Emergent has avoided like the plague since its inception.
Some background: The Episcopal
Church has a female Presiding Bishop, a woman who is infinitely more suited for
and better at the job than her two immediate (male) predecessors. My own diocese has a
female suffragan bishop who is one of the most incredible people in the church
(or indeed out of it) that I have ever worked with. My own congregation is
headed by a woman priest who is again, one of the best I have ever known. In my
church’s corner of the diocese there are eight churches in our region, two of
them headed by gay priests, three by women. And these are by no means people of some
wishy-washy faith . So if you’re talking about “emerging” from anything, the
Episcopal Church in my neck of the woods has emerged a considerable way from
the patriarchal ways that define most of the church’s history.
Is the Episcopal
Church perfect? We would be the first to admit we’re not. We even have the
liturgy to ensure that we acknowledge that every time we meet. Like most denominations,
the Episcopal Church has operated as a top-down hierarchy for much of its
existence, but a new generation of leadership recognizes that this cannot and
should not continue. I am particularly hopeful that our new Diocesan bishop, Greg Rickel, with Bishop Nedi's help, will be a breath of fresh air. The superstructure should only exist to ensure the roots
are fed and healthy. I am confident we are getting there. Slowly maybe, but
making progress.
Anyway, without further ado, here are some excerpts from the interview with Tony Jones from the book, with commentary.
Format is: Question / Answer / Commentary
Tonight was the 4th annual Waiting in the Starlight Advent service at my church. It's an alt-worship type of experience with stations of various kinds. One of the biggest thrills of the church year for me is when D (my main co-conspirator) and I lay down the Christmas star in tape on the parish hall floor. It's just magical to see the first couple of tape stripes go down and see the star form emerge.
We have always placed a manger in the center of the star as the primary focus.
Last year we started and ended with live music provided by the three Daves - myself and two friends also called Dave, as it happens. One of those friends, Dave B, is a pretty good songwriter, and in response to a comment I made a couple of years ago about there being a dearth of Advent songs, he's written a couple of excellent ones, which we now play at the service.
We also usually change things up a bit each year, as some stations work better than others and there's always room for improvement. This year, based on Maggi Dawn's Advent and Epiphany devotional, Beginnings and Endings (and what happens in between), I added a station called Eat, Drink, Sleep based on the Dec 12 reading from Maggi's book (and at her suggestion and prior experience, I should add...) It worked very well for me, as I managed a 10 minute nap.
The whole evening worked out quite well, although attendance was sparse due to the snow that arrived today. Washingtonians don't do snow very well. But really, it's not about how many people show up, it's about how much those who do get out of it. And Advent this year is turning out to be very meaningful to me.
Interesting little article on the emerging church from the floor of the Christian Booksellers Association trade show. Some snippets:
From the odd:
One morning as I walked through a hotel lobby, I spotted a badge-free person with a particularly familiar face and smiled in a most cheerful manner, stopping just short of saying, “Hey, how are you doing?” The familiar face, as it turned out, belonged to Chuck Norris. I tell that story for three reasons:
1) it’s a good story;
2) I’m hoping the search engines will draw Chuck Norris fans to this site; and
3) it underscores the fact that you never know who will show up at CBA.
Norris was there promoting his autobiography, Against All Odds, which releases in September.
to comments on evangelicalism...
I also identify with evangelical Christianity... Even so, I am among those who have grown increasingly disenchanted with evangelicalism. Don’t get me wrong—I could sign, and have signed, any basic statement of faith issued by most evangelical ministries and companies. It’s not a problem of doctrine; it’s a problem of practice.
to the bizarre
This year, I asked a fellow Episcopalian, a book editor who could have easily sat out the event, why he bothered to attend. “Are you kidding?” he said. “I love CBA—it’s so bizarre!” Amen to that. Display cases in the lobby of the Georgia World Congress Center, where the event was held, exhibited such items as Actual Brimstone from Sodom and Gomorrah and canvas sandals featuring an embroidered scripture reference and American flag, for those who feel the need to wear their faith and their patriotism on their feet. More than a few groups of journalists hold annual contests to see who can come up with the best example of “Jesus junk” from the trade floor.
and then, to some comments on the emerging church:
What the emerging church offers and encourages is a new way of doing church and being the church, one that resonates not only with the 18-to-34-year-old demographic—the first fully postmodern generation—but also with people who think like those in the younger demographic but are older in age. Or way older, like me. If you came to faith in Christ during the Jesus Movement of the 1970s as I did, you should readily understand the emerging church. Remember how we tried to create a whole new model based on Luke’s description of the early church in the book of Acts? Well, the emerging church is succeeding where we failed, for reasons I can only speculate about. Sometimes I think we just gave up too soon. We ended up with some decent alternatives for that time (think Vineyard Fellowship and Calvary Chapel), but that’s not what we really wanted. What we really wanted then is what they’re actually doing now.
There's been so much swirling around in my brain the last few weeks that I feel guilty about not getting around to writing about some it. A lot of it has been prompted by the role of women in the church.
It started back in September when I had a chance to spend half a day with Maggi Dawn over in Cambridge. One of the many things we talked about was sparked by a question she asked me about the feminization of the church – basically, has it alienated men?
My short answer was that the church has always been run mostly by women, they just haven't been able to hold the reins of leadership officially for most of church history, and even today there are only limited parts of the world where they are allowed (almost) equal power.
This is a huge issue, because the vast majority of the Emergent/Emerging Church (not a) movement is dealing with the issue for the first time, being comprised mostly of people emerging from a fundamentalist evangelical perspective where women can basically do anything they want, as long as it's limited to making the coffee after church.
Anne Ursu: The Shadow Thieves (Ursu, Anne. Chronos Chronicles, Bk. 1.)
Brian D. McLaren: The Secret Message of Jesus: Uncovering the Truth That Could Change Everything
Donald Miller: Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality
Sonya Sones: One of Those Hideous Books Where the Mother Dies
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