Clarifying

For almost a year now I've been talking about what is changing in the wider culture and in the Church and my desire to respond to those changes through the community of faith I serve and in my role as a pastor and religious leader. One of the responses I see to these changes and cultural shifts is found in the emergent conversation of leaders like Brian McLaren, Doug Pagitt, Tony Jones, Shane Claiborne and so many others. I have spent the last year diving into the thinking of these folks and others and trying to find ways to express what is changing and how I would like to respond to those changes. I have felt for a long, long time that the Christian faith I was raised with, the gift of faith I received from my parents and the various churches we attended, has been sidelined and needs to work harder to make its presence known in our world today.

What exactly is changing? How can liberal and progressive congregations respond to these changes? What is up with all this talk of emerging and emergent church and worship and theology?

When I think about what is changing in the world that is calling out for a positive response from Progressive Christians I think of the greater pluralism of our society that can no longer swallow the exclusivist belief that only those who believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior have access to heaven or eternal life. Progressive Christians have to let the world know that we struggle with this belief, too and tend to err on the side of affirming diversity and the all-inclusive love of God.

I think about all the things we know about the world and the way it works and the increasing discomfort with being told to believe in a God who created this incredibly complex and mysterious world in 7 days and who only cares about our salvation from this world and not about the health and well beingn of the world itself. Progressive Christians need to speak out about our ability to hold our creation story in creative conversation with the science of evolution.

I think about how the church has been in the business for far too long of teaching a religion and a God that people can no longer believe in. Christianity as it has been taught and defined in so many churches in recent history is no longer credible or believable to so many people in our world. But there is a whole stream of Christianity that doesn't try to sell this bill of goods. This stream of Christianity, my home, has been pushed to the margins. I want our voices to be heard once again. I want us to stand up with the faith we know and love as Progressive Christians and share that faith with the wider world to offer an alternative voice that emphasizes inclusion, mystery and wonder, questions and seeking, humility in interpretation and a sincere effort to live one's faith each and every day no matter how difficult that is in community with others who are also embracing that journey.

And when I talked about the great emergence and emergent communities and the emerging church I am referring to a conversation that has arisen primarily in the world of evangelical Christianity. Some Evangelical Christians have grown unsatisfied with the version of the Christian faith taught in their churches and are finding a wide variety of ways to express that disatisfaction. Some are mostly seeking to re-imagine worship without changing the doctrine or theology with which they are most comfortable. Some are seeking primarily to re-imagine church and moving away from the mega church model and toward a house church model again without changing much in terms of theology and doctrine. Some are placing greater emphasis on the teachings of reformers like John Calvin, Martin Luther and Johnathan Edwards while still maintaining most of the theological beliefs of their more conservative counterparts. Finally, there are still others who are reimagining worship and theology by questioning many of the doctrines and beliefs of the faith of their childhood and moving more and more in the theological direction of the historic mainline and progressive Christian traditions.

This is a huge shift that is taking place and it is bound to impact public discourse about religion and Christianity. Those of us in the historically mainline but currently sidelined progressive Protestant traditions have a lot to offer to this conversation and much to gain by joining forces with our sisters and brothers of the faith who are asking these questions and re-imagining the faith in creative and innovative ways. We also have much to learn. I for one am incredibly excited by the conversation and energized by this shift.

The effort to clarify my own thinking on all of these things continues. I'm confident that the experience of my upcoming sabbatial during which I will visit congregations that consider themselves part of the emergent community seeking to re-imagine doctrine and theology as well as established congregations making efforts to respond to what is happening in the world of evangelical Christianity and also in the wider world will be immensely valuable in this regard.

People are asking questions and are no longer satisfied with being told that their questions are wrong or inappropriate. People are yearning for an expression of faith that meets them where they are, that guides them in living engaged, faithful lives in this world, that honors their minds, bodies and spirits and stimulates their hearts to respond to the needs of all of God's awesome and mysterious creation. I want to respond. I want to share the richness of my own tradition with seekers, believers and non-belivers, questioners and doubters, the cast out and excluded because I believe this is what God is calling me to do and I believe it is what Jesus yearns for all who sincerely follow his way to also do. Will you join me in your own way?