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Final Thoughts on Pagan Christianity
This will (probably) be my last post on Pagan Christianity, (the previous two being here and here) and I wanted to address some comments (and an email) that I have received over the past few days.
The book (Pagan Christianity) has apparently been a bit of a controversial deal on the blogosphere, it seems that every time it’s mentioned there are both proponents and opponents that are vocal about their support/dissent. Any time you have this sort of discourse then the time must be taken to understand both sides of the argument.
The common theme I am hearing is that Reimagining Church, puts in place a new construct after PC tore the old one down. I, however, have a problem with this concept from the start. Pete Rollins in a podcast with Josh Case from The Nick and Josh Podcast (now the Josh and Josh podcast, as Nick’s gallivanting the globe) discussed the idea of deconstruction ending with reconstruction, and said (paraphrased here) “Deconstruction is the lava that keeps the flow of ideas moving, we should never stop deconstructing.” I completely agree with Rollins here, and I hesitate whenever I hear the word “reconstruct.”
The reason far my tepid outlook on reconstruction is the fear that what we reconstruct will simply become another monstrosity of “orthopraxy” (I say orthopraxy in the term of right practice in regards to how we do church) that must again be torn down. When we reconstruct we make the assumption that we have found the “right” way of doing things, which seems to be an arrogant statement in light of how long we (Christians) have been chasing the idea of orthopraxy.
I’m not saying that any reconstruction is bad, in fact we will certainly reconstruct as we go, but we need to keep the urgency of deconstruction with us at all times, lest whatever practices we build, to better engage in our (post)modern culture, become standardized and passed down to later generations in which they will have little (or no) effect.
That being said, I will indeed read Reimagining Church, if for no other reason than I’ve now been told by several people that I should do so.
I have also been told that I misunderstood the intent of Viola/Barna in Pagan Christianity. From the e-mail I received:
you seemed to have missed the point. Barna and Viola are NOT arguing to go back to a biblical blueprintism. They are instead tracing where the protestant traditions came from and raising questions. Frank’s new book REIMAGINING CHURCH — the constructive follow-up to PAGAN CHRISTIANITY –deals with the very issues you address, like contextualization.
While this may be true, I still feel that I what was being laid out in PC was this ideal of “Biblical Blueprintism” (good phrase by the way), and I don’t think I’m the only one who was under that impression.
One final statement: This book, regardless of whether or not those who read it agree or disagree with it, has sparked a great deal of conversation in regards to how we “do church,” and if for nothing other than that fact the authors need to be commended.
More on Pagan Christianity
I think I need to go back and explain in (more) depth my disagreement with Viola and Barna (V/B) and some of the tone laid out in Pagan Christianity. As I said before, the tone seemed to be one of “Unless things are like they were in the Early Church, they should not be in practice today.” While in some cases, our lost “sight” of “the way things were” has indeed hurt us, so will doing things simply because they “were.”
I’m reminded of the story that Pete Rollins tells in one of his books (I think it’s Fidelity of Betrayal, but it could be How (not) to Speak of God), about the Rabbi who ties the cat to the tree because the cat screeches while the Rabbi is trying to teach. After the Rabbi dies the community continues to tie the cat to the tree, as the act has now become habit. That cat dies and the community, now having moved habit into tradition finds another cat to replace the original, and the line continues until the tying of a cat to a tree becomes orthodoxical for services. What was once done out of the expediency of the moment has become a cumbersome system complete with it’s own rituals and requirements.
In this same way, if we were to do certain things simply because they Early Church did them that way (I guess I should state I’m speaking only in regards to how we conduct our assemblies services) then we fill ourselves with cumbersome material which actually inhibits our understanding. For example, the practice of only meeting in the homes of other members is nowhere mandated by the Bible, yet it was a practice committed (According to V/B) during the Early Church years. (On a side note, I have heard it also stated that early assemblies met in catacombs and in synagogues, so I’m not sure about V/B’s historical account here). If we were to only hold our assemblies in the homes of members today, when other space is available more suiting to the needs of the community, then we encumber ourselves with needless ritual.
On the other hand, with a practice such as the Lords Supper, an embrace of Early Church forms and rituals would be most beneficial. As V/B state, the historical Lords Supper, or at least during the Early Church years, was actually a feast in which the poor and the rich would dine together in a common bond of Christ. Having forgotten that the Bible is in fact a book written for the oppressed and (**mostly) by the oppressed, the insistence that the Lords Feast be shared by all would likely do the Church a fair amount of good.
The largest issue we’re presented with is a cultural chage from the first several centuries AD (or CE if you’d prefer) to the current age. While practices committed in the Early Church indeed made sense for them, in many cases blindly clinging to such practices today would be detrimental to the health of the Church. The key is not in simply doing things the way the Early Church did them, but instead understanding why the Early Church did them in such ways.
This same understanding should in turn be applied to each incarnation of the church throughout the centuries. A fundamentalist would do well in understanding why (s)he does things the way (s)he does, instead of simply doing them because that is how they have been done. In that same way, those who would state that we must do things the way the Early Church did them should take a look at the whys, lest they practice a form of fundamentalism themselves. A decent heaping of deconstruction would do us all a fair load of good when it comes to the way we do things, as well as a cultural understanding of how things need to be tweaked in order to better affect the world in which we find ourselves.
The understanding of cultural shifts, and the need to adjust in order to best work (both) within (and without) those shifts is imperative to the effectiveness of the Church. It is this same thought process in which Emergent (and to a larger extent the emerging church) must operate. So, again, I am lead to disagree with the underlying statement in Pagan Christianity which would lead us to this quasi-fundamentalism.
Pagan Christianity(?)… my thoughts
Pagan Christianity By Frank Viola and George Barna
I finished Pagan Christianity shortly before leaving for my family vacation last week, I had time to post something beforehand, but I’m lazy, so here it is… only a week and a half late.
I found that I actually enjoyed Pagan Christianity more than I thought I would originally. I think there is a largely mixed bag of reviews out there about the book, so I was rather hesitant before actually purchasing it (the poor selection of books at the store I was in helped out a bit). A little backstory on the authors, if you didn’t know, Frank Viola is a big house church proponent and loosely affiliated with the Emerging movement, and George Barna is and evangelical and the creator of the Barna Group, which has put out some pretty controversial poll findings.
Form not Power
(Grandiose and superfluous HT to Blake for this)
When do we have the form without the power of religion?
When we develop church growth strategies that target the middle class instead of the poor and marginalized, then we have the form without the power.
When we spend more of our resources on constructing and maintaining Church buildings and property than we do on feeding the hungry, then we have the form without the power.
When we spend more on pastor’s salaries, benefits, and pensions, than we do on clothing the naked and sheltering the homeless, then we have the form without the power.
When we turn stewardship into financial campaigns for the Church, rather than sacrifice for the poor, then we have the form but not the power.
When we blame poverty on the sloth of the poor rather than the avarice of the prosperous and the indifference of the comfortable, then we have the form but not the power.
When we furnish our sanctuaries and social halls in such a way as to make the prosperous comfortable rather than make the indigent welcome, then we have the form but not the power.
When we dedicate Methodist institutions like universities and hospitals and retirement homes to the needs of the affluent rather than the needs of the impoverished, then we have the form but not the power.
When we preach a grace which saves us without changing us, then we have the form but not the power.
Above all whenever and however we make of Methodism a preferential option for the middle class, we have the form but not the power of religion.
Powerful, this.
I must look over this list and ponder, how often I’ve missed the point, and how in by missing the point I’ve done more damage to the power of ressurection than I’d like to admit.
I think if I could add to this list (and make it somewhat more personal) I’d throw something out there like:
When we blog about the resurrection of mankind, without going out and actively being that resurrection, we have the form but not the power of religion.
What would you add?
a week?!
Wow, it’s been a whole week. I haven’t gone this long in updating… ever (in the whole history of my blog… since January ☺), but I kind of needed a break, and my life got a little hectic after Thursday. In case you weren’t paying attention to the twitter feed, we brought home a new family member on Wednesday.
A 2000 Kawasaki Ninja 250. (For the uninitiated… it’s a motorcycle).
I promise that I’ll post about it soon, as I know my grandparents (who frequent the blog more than anyone else, which is great) are quite desirous to find out what’s going on with the bike.
But, there’s kind of another reason I haven’t been blogging too much recently. It appears my blog has attracted some attention (finally) of those that I actually know personally, and not all are too thrilled. To clarify, I run in evangelical circles, and those who adhere and look up to the thoughts, theology, and ideals of John MacArthur and Ravvi Zacharias (and probably Al Mohler, but I’ve never actually heard anyone besides myself speak of him). So there are some out there that aren’t too thrilled with the theology that both Becky and I are discussing.
I’ve also run up against those who aren’t pleased with some of the words I have expressed over my church, there were some posts all the way at the beginning in which I expressed distress over the level of social justice in my church, as well as more recent posts where I discuss issues with the college group I’m volunteer for. I was chastised for expressing my thoughts on such a public forum where those that know me could read it and would know exactly what church I’m talking about. I was then encouraged to take my concerns to the leadership, a move that I have not done.
It’s not that I’m scared of controversy, or of differing opinions (just the opposite in fact, I find myself listening to opposing opinions quite often just to hear their points), but it’s the fact that sometimes it’s easier to go without it. I was worried about balancing my posts between what I actually have in mind, and what’s not going to piss off the people who are pretty easy to piss off. I think if they had their way, I’d keep all church issues I disagree with private (tell that to Martin Luther btw), and I’d keep my theological mindset within the boundaries of the established Evangelical Systematic Theology.
Well, I won’t. I’m curious though, if any of my blogging cohorts have run up against similar issues.
the truth project
So I’ve made it no secret that I’m not a big fan of certain things that the college group I’m a part of does. From the “apologetics” to the attempt to mimic the now defunct 7:22, some of the things just don’t sit right with me.
A couple weeks ago I was told that I would really want to attend the summer series that the group is putting on, and then I checked out the video trailer for the DVD series they’re doing. While I wasn’t entirely paying attention, I did see that Ravi Zacharias was one of the speakers, which piqued my curiosity. The last recollection I had of Ravi was in a video where he quips, about Emergent, “Did they get bored with God?” I didn’t really give it all much thought at the time, I think I was working on another project, so it just kind of fell to the back of my mind.
Well, we played the trailer for the college group on Thursday night, and I’m the video guy, so I watched the thing through a couple hours before the service. That’s when I really started to notice things. The video seemed to be set up as a highly (literal six day) Creationistic account of things, which I guess shouldn’t have surprised me. But something else bothered me, their whole “Worldviews” thing, I just hadn’t heard it used and sound like that before. Well, that’s when I saw the biggest key, the big old “Focus on the Family Ministries” blurb right at the end of the video. Oh boy, it’s on.
That’s when I started doing a bit of research into the whole deal. Unfortunately there was not but one “critical” view of the DVD’s, so I had to use other sites, but here’s the essence of what I discovered.
It can be summed up with this blurb, from christianpost.com
Some 700 believers sat in the pews of First Baptist Church Friday night to learn of the “great battle” they are waging in at Focus on the Family’s The Truth Project training session. The cosmos battle: Truth vs. Lies; Christian worldview vs. Postmodern worldview; God is vs. God isn’t.
That’s right ladies and gentlemen; Postmodernists are liars who don’t believe in God. The Truth Project’s own website states that the series was created because of a Barna study that says that only 5% of adults surveyed have a Biblical Worldview. What the hell? Who are they to define Biblical worldview? Barna, by the way, defines biblical worldview thusly;
For the purposes of the research, a biblical worldview was defined as believing that absolute moral truths exist; that such truth is defined by the Bible; and firm belief in six specific religious views. Those views were that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life; God is the all-powerful and all-knowing Creator of the universe and He stills rules it today; salvation is a gift from God and cannot be earned; Satan is real; a Christian has a responsibility to share their faith in Christ with other people; and the Bible is accurate in all of its teachings.
Really? Those are the requirements? And they wonder why only 5% actually hold to them.
So, I’m deciding whether or not to attend at all during this “series” or if I want to boycott it out right, not that boycotting it would make any difference to anyone who propagates this DVD series within the church. We’ll see.
This by the way, all gives me fodder for my next post… stay tuned, there should be some interesting conversation that shoots for that one.
By the way, have you checked out the Indian Taxi Fund?
house… church
What does it say about me that if my wife and I were to start a house church we’re pretty sure after week one it would just be the two of us?
Or does it say something about my friends more so than myself?
Is it possible to have a house church with a group of friends who don’t agree theologically on a ton of points?
How do you even start a house church?
Am I even ready to start one?
I want to start a house church. The questions are killing me.
the story (before the pill)
This one is kind of long, I’m not known for the length of my posts, but it’s a good story.
Trajectory is such an interesting concept if you think about it. An object, put in motion, will essentially hold to the same trajectory, unless acted upon by another force. Be that force gravitational pulls, “roadblocks,” or other human intervention, the object will remain on whatever it was originally set upon, unless those objects which have potential to act do so. The object itself has no ability whatsoever to influence it’s trajectory.
Trajectory in my life is particularly interesting.
I was born into a family of relapsed Christians. A few years after my mother and birth father divorced, my mother and the man I consider my father began living together. They weren’t particularly religious people, from what I can remember our religious rites consisted of visiting churches occasionally (I think we went mostly to mainstream churches back in the old days). My parents eventually got married, and began attending the church that I basically grew up in.
Here’s where my trajectory began. The church we attended was a southern Baptist church, Bible thumping, sin condemning, angry church. My personal theology formed tightly around the ideas I was taught in my Sunday school classes, in “big church,” and various church “camps” I attended throughout the years. I was fully indoctrinated in the systematic theology of the Southern Baptist convention, full with the idea of such an angry and quite bitter God. Can we see where my trajectory was taking me?
The other acting force upon my life was my family. My dad was (and is for the most part) a staunch republican. I can remember various comments over the years like “The only right vote is a straight republican ticket,” and something along the lines of us needing to kill all the Palestinians. I look up to my dad, he’s the hardest working man I’ve ever met, I’m eternally grateful for all the sacrifices he’s made over the years to enable me to reach where I am today, but my respect for him caused his influence on my worldview to be very great. Can we see where that trajectory was taking me?
The third influence on my life was my friends, Not my church friends, but my other friends. While the first two big influences on my life put me on a similar trajectory, this third group was the first to gently change it. The direction they shifted it into was where I ended up for several years (quite some time in my short life). They were the group who introduced me to the lovely (sarcasm) world of alcohol, drugs, and other such worldly influences that both my (former) church, and family feared greatly. I began to essentially set myself between two opposing forces, which inevitably leads to some major problems.
The problem with my original trajectory is it’s far from sustainable. The various views on God, eschatology, and our (Christian) relationship with the world inevitably lead to such anger and ill will. I embraced it all with such passion, but the problem is that these views can’t possibly continue on without the person who holds them destroying themselves, with the help of the third influence I did just that. I never became a “druggie” or alcoholic, or any of those things that when people are ‘saved’ from become stories of incredible wonder within the “church,” instead I began to lead my life of duality. This duality eventually merged and placed me on the fast track to self-destruction.
Here’s the kicker. I was getting married around the same time that these two forces began to act like the old homemade volcanoes from science class. My poor wife was subjected to such anger (thank god never physically manifested), that I’m somewhat amazed that she stuck with me (though her pluck and resolve have done me great help in this area).
This self destructive trajectory would have lead me down a road that probably would have ended up with an atheistic (at the very least agnostic) world view, without my wife, and in such a miserable state that I’d be the poster child for all the happy pills in the world.
Tommorow: A much lighter post on the Red Pill
my sad fears
So the emergent cohort for the Atlanta area meets tomorrow, but I don’t think I’m going to go.
Why? Because I’m a chicken.
I’m completely comfortable with online posting of my thoughts, listening to others thoughts and opinions, and on carrying conversations. But you get me in with a group of people I don’t really know and I don’t quite come out of my shell.
I can handle like one on one meetings well and stuff like that, but talking to groups of people I don’t know and so on is difficult for me. I’m rather nervous, never having met any of the people and such. It sounds silly, but for some reason it’s a grounded fear for me.
I think I can handle going to an emergent conference and meeting people there, but to me this seems like I’d be trying to “break” into a set group.
Anyways, I’ll let you know if I go or not. (and if I do- what I think)
Technorati Tags: emergent, cohort
The New Christians
So I read through it all last night, up until about five minutes ago. I’ll say that I was rather impressed with it. I just wish I knew how to describe it. Josh (at least I think it was Josh, it may have been Nick but I’m pretty sure it was Josh) of the Nick and Josh podcast said that it was essentially what Emergent will be known for. I’m not doing his statement full justice, you should probably go listen to the podcast, but that was the gist of it.
Anyways, here’s my thoughts.
I’d recommend this book to those wanting to know more about the emergent movement as it describes the movement in enough tangible ideas that those not yet in the conversation can understand. I’d say while not on the theological level of an NT Wright essay (who does reach that level?) Tony brings up some good points, thusly the book would fit in with the collection of any emergent.
Tony does a great job of capturing emergent in a way that describes the similarities yet doesn’t confine any emerging church to anything. There are broad strokes painted on what emergent communities look like with fine details being filled in only on the four emergent churches he profiles at the end of the book. (More on my opinions on this later)
The book is somewhat broken up into three different sections (at least from my perspective). Tony starts off with the cause for the creation (and brief history) of emergent, the steps over to theology, and ends up with the church profiling mentioned above.
Being that my favorite thing of late has been to read theology it was the center chapters that grabbed me the strongest. It’s easy for me to pick a favorite part, there is a brilliant “conversation” between a Biblicist, a character called a brain (essentially a fundamentalist), and an emergent, attempting to recap it here wouldn’t even come close to doing it justice, so I’ll put in a plug and say buy the book.
I’m not sure that the descriptions of the emerging churches quite do the movement justice. I know that some people want to see descriptions of how emergent groups look, but honestly I think that there is entirely more to the movement than described in the four churches Tony looked at.
Like I said- I see the need for this section, but I wish that perhaps a larger grouping could have been shown. Maybe Mars Hill Bible Church in Minnesota isn’t truly considered an emerging church (I haven’t ever heard Bell straight up claim it) but I feel that MHBC would be another face of the actual ecclesiastical face of the Emergent movement. That is really my only caveat with the book.
One thing I want to know more about is the section entitled “Time to Rethink Seminary.” I’m aspiring to go to seminary, like I said before, I love theology and deeply desire to know as many viewpoints on it as possible. I also want to gain a deeper understanding of the historicity of the Biblical narrative. I salivate (sometimes literally… ok not really) when I hear someone with a decent enough grasp of history discussing the Biblical narrative, I want to learn more about it. Seminary seems like a great place to do so, right? You’d think… but Tony, towards the end of the section, talks about New Monastic Communities as places of learning. I want to know more.
Reading: Blue Like Jazz by: Donald Miller