Throwing in the cowl, or kicking the habit?
The santa fe trail has been a little quiet for the last couple of weeks. Sorry about that. There are a few reasons - one is that I've been busy chatting and posting on other blogs a bit, as well as being busy with assignments and stuff. Another reason is best summarised by my previous post - just wanting to make sure thinking doesn't become an idol.
Here's a few thoughts that are coming together in my head at the moment. Firstly, there's been a roaring discussion on what has been call "Network Church" over on Boxologies - worth a read, especially if you're going to join us for Coffee Shop Theology this weekend. Secondly, I've been writing an essay on Charles Spurgeon and his involvement in the "Down Grade Controversy" of the late 1800s. No, I hadn't heard of it either. Johnny does a good summary (as well as some good reflection) here.
Here's a few thoughts that are coming together in my head at the moment. Firstly, there's been a roaring discussion on what has been call "Network Church" over on Boxologies - worth a read, especially if you're going to join us for Coffee Shop Theology this weekend. Secondly, I've been writing an essay on Charles Spurgeon and his involvement in the "Down Grade Controversy" of the late 1800s. No, I hadn't heard of it either. Johnny does a good summary (as well as some good reflection) here.
So what's the connection?
Here are my questions: is the move away from congregationalism (represented by network church) the final decisive step in kicking our addiction to empire-building (as has been suggested)? Is it protest? Or is is a retreat of some sort; even a surrender to the individualism of our age?
Spurgeon (at least according to one historian I read) seems to have chosen the path of protest. When he left the Baptist Union, he formed no alternative denomination and generally dissuaded people from following him. In a sense he made a (quasi-monastic?) protest rather than seek to remain in the BU and critically engage with the "down grade" in an effort to reform.
All well and good, and protest is often necessary, but the problem was that he seems to have paved the way for the reactionary (protest) Fundamentalism of the 1920s, and the equally saddening (protest) theological liberalism - both of which were totally modernist responses and still cause us pain today. I wonder what would have happened if Spurgeon had stayed in the BU and engaged more constructively with the rising liberalism. Would both sides have found a less reactionary path?
In protesting against anything (whether the congregation, or the modernist church status quo - a la emergent) there seems to be this danger of polarization. God forbid that I should become an Emergent Fundamentalist, or a Network Fundamantalist, or a Monastic Fundamentalist - and (worse) that those who follow me would entrench this further.
Here's a comment from Gibbs and Bolger's new book: "People are both hungry for relationships and yet at the same time ill prepared for the costs involved. In a culture in which casual relationships or contractual relationships are the norm, it is difficult to build relationships on deep foundations that can survive disagreements and disappointments. People are more prone to walk away when the going becomes difficult than to work through a crisis to the point where a new depth of understanding is reached."
This is a challenge to us all, whether networky types, urban monks, or emergent churches. So there's the thing on my mind as I look for a job after graduation - protest or reform? In the words of the Clash: "Should I stay or should I go?"
Here are my questions: is the move away from congregationalism (represented by network church) the final decisive step in kicking our addiction to empire-building (as has been suggested)? Is it protest? Or is is a retreat of some sort; even a surrender to the individualism of our age?
Spurgeon (at least according to one historian I read) seems to have chosen the path of protest. When he left the Baptist Union, he formed no alternative denomination and generally dissuaded people from following him. In a sense he made a (quasi-monastic?) protest rather than seek to remain in the BU and critically engage with the "down grade" in an effort to reform.
All well and good, and protest is often necessary, but the problem was that he seems to have paved the way for the reactionary (protest) Fundamentalism of the 1920s, and the equally saddening (protest) theological liberalism - both of which were totally modernist responses and still cause us pain today. I wonder what would have happened if Spurgeon had stayed in the BU and engaged more constructively with the rising liberalism. Would both sides have found a less reactionary path?
In protesting against anything (whether the congregation, or the modernist church status quo - a la emergent) there seems to be this danger of polarization. God forbid that I should become an Emergent Fundamentalist, or a Network Fundamantalist, or a Monastic Fundamentalist - and (worse) that those who follow me would entrench this further.
Here's a comment from Gibbs and Bolger's new book: "People are both hungry for relationships and yet at the same time ill prepared for the costs involved. In a culture in which casual relationships or contractual relationships are the norm, it is difficult to build relationships on deep foundations that can survive disagreements and disappointments. People are more prone to walk away when the going becomes difficult than to work through a crisis to the point where a new depth of understanding is reached."
This is a challenge to us all, whether networky types, urban monks, or emergent churches. So there's the thing on my mind as I look for a job after graduation - protest or reform? In the words of the Clash: "Should I stay or should I go?"
posted by Jamie at Friday, May 26, 2006
3 Comments:
g'day.
i'm an NZer living in glasgow. graeme mcmeekin told about coffee shop theology and i've read a bit of your sites. it's cool to read stuff i've spend a lot of time questioning aswell. i see you've read allan hirsh stuff. i went to a Forge week in melbourne and heard a lot of emerging church discussion. i'm really into it.
i work in a cafe weeknights and always thought it would be cool to have something like CST. any way, love your writings. vaughan
interesting stuff: 2 responses..
one about 'the individual' the other about 'community' (as if one works against the other?)
it has been argued that fundamentalism is merely a stage of spiritual growth as is a later 'liberal phase' -
there is, as it is argued' a third phase:
integrational..
as one becomes an adult - the child and teen come with us - it is the task then to draw out the good aspects of each phase and NOT GET STUCK in either of them.. when the time comes to grow up!
the modern christian 'ideal' (again an ideal that hounds us during both fundie/lib stages of christian growth)
biblical community, however is much different - modern notions of community (in the north/west) are very thin attenuated version of jewish and celtic understanding of: 'community'
modern 'christian' community = God and persons
biblical community= God, person and place/land/creation ..
hence modern christianity's more toxic attempts to find off-world places of 'home' or security in the air - in spiritual/ecclesial 'status' in our dwindling sectarian economies.. disconnected from the stories, tears, screams of creation and of the land here..
john the baptist's cry (and the father's) is a tender call - to his people whose very souls were being hollowed out by slowly selling out to empire - return to incarnation/land/stories to the presence of yhwh in the scarred land under our feet - where the Christ is not afraid to touch the poor or feel the scars of the land under his feet..
in conclusion - we need a much phatter, thicker, deeper - understanding of how 'individuals-in-community grows..
jesus and john the baptist are great
at community and they were very much individuals (not either or- growing/weaveing together into full whole/holy being)
just some thoughts..
Thanks for your comments Paul. Where did you read the idea that there is a fundamentalist-liberal 'growth pattern'? Not heard that before. I know some people who have grown in the opposite direction, as well as some - myself included - who find both terms increasingly irrelevant. (and not to mention the Catholics and Eastern Orthodox who may well find this whole Protestant labelling irrelevant)
I have some further thoughts on community and engagement with creation. I agree that we need to move away from Christian community that is an escape from creation and towards a deeper engagement with our (socio-)geography. Your thoughts on Scotland are a valuable step in that direction.
I think that community has to be formed in the context of engagement with, rather than escape from, our surroundings. None of us exist in a vacuum: we are shaped by our environment. We should be spending time praying, worshipping and working for the kingdom in that environment as much as possible. (this is the ethos of CST)
But does proper engagement with creation/land necessarily mean movement away from Christian community (in the sense of the gathered body of believers)? This feels a little like further polarization (i.e. congregation VERSUS land/creation engagement). Correct me if I've misunderstood. If anything, I believe that the local expression of church (congregation) is the ideal vehicle for engagement with the land - a gathered people from and in a parcticular place.
Of course, the danger of some large city-centre churches is that they become anything but this, being composed of a commuter population who come together by car, and swiftly return to the suburbs - this is an exercise in retreat from the land. In a lot of Protestant congregations (especially the conservative type) this is often accompanied by a dualistic theology of spirit/matter whilch reinforces the need to 'escape' the world in order to worship 'properly'.
This faulty theology, and the practise that comes with it, needs to be addressed for us to be truly kingdom people.
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