Nothing New Under the Sun
Thus spaketh me, in response to a great Brian Mclaren book, Finding Our Way Again. The book looks at the challenges within Christianity today (increasing social marginalization, increasing diversity, decreasing membership, increasing apathy from within and without, etc.) and says, as so many have said before, that the Church's future may well be in its past:
"Those who reject religion," he argues, "are often rejecting a certain arid system of belief, or, if not that, a set of trivial taboos or rules or rituals that have lost meaning for them - each the thin residue of a lost way of life."
The solution? The rediscovery of that Christian way of life, the spiritual practices that restore "sacred normalcy to the rhythms of life." He cites seven practices as commonly held amongst the Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity and Islam, in chronological order): Fixed hour prayer, fasting, Sabbath, the sacred meal, pilgrimage, observance of sacred seasons, and giving.
"The challenge of the future," he says, "will require, we realize, rediscovery and adaptive reuse of resources from the ancient past. He proposes a vision of a "fourth way . . . [reaching] toward an alternative beyond a reductionist secularism, beyond a reactive and intransigent fundamentalism, and beyond a vague, consumerist spirituality." This way of life, he argues, is not only faithful, it is compelling and timeless.
I say "nothing new under the sun," (a quote from Ecclesiastes 1:9), because this is such a perpetual pattern of the church. A few examples come to mind (though there are many more):
In the fourth and fifth century, when Christianity became accepted by, and subsequently enmeshed with, Roman political authority, many Christians self-exiled to the desert and formed monastic communities (some of which persist in some form), reclaiming the marginal, alternative existence most appropriate to those with the good news that the kingdom of God is encroaching upon the world.
During the Reformations of the 16th and 17th centuries, many felt that Christianity's evolution to Christendom was a betrayal of God's truest self-revelation: a Christ who came in fragile form, preaching and healing, serving and suffering. Jesus betrayed all expectation for the Messiah who would restore God's chosen people to power, yet the Church who bore his name was obsessed with it's own political, economic, social and spiritual power. And so the Reformers called the future church to the form and function of the ancient church, looking to the authority of Scripture and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit for guidance. (Were they successful? Well, that's a doozy of a question for another time).
The point is, the impulse is there and the pattern is familiar. There was something frighteningly compelling about the early Christians, who were, by all accounts, neither rich nor popular nor powerful. What they had, under the best of circumstances, was a way of life, rooted in Jewish tradition but flourishing in diverse ways. And this way of life was compelling enough to grow from an obscure movement to a global community that outlives every empire it encounters.
The question is (as I see it), Do we have the conviction to (again) make this "fourth way" viable, living deeply into our tradition, adopting Christianity as a way of life, even as it may well move us to the margins, not just of society, but of Christianity itself?
"Those who reject religion," he argues, "are often rejecting a certain arid system of belief, or, if not that, a set of trivial taboos or rules or rituals that have lost meaning for them - each the thin residue of a lost way of life."
The solution? The rediscovery of that Christian way of life, the spiritual practices that restore "sacred normalcy to the rhythms of life." He cites seven practices as commonly held amongst the Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity and Islam, in chronological order): Fixed hour prayer, fasting, Sabbath, the sacred meal, pilgrimage, observance of sacred seasons, and giving.
"The challenge of the future," he says, "will require, we realize, rediscovery and adaptive reuse of resources from the ancient past. He proposes a vision of a "fourth way . . . [reaching] toward an alternative beyond a reductionist secularism, beyond a reactive and intransigent fundamentalism, and beyond a vague, consumerist spirituality." This way of life, he argues, is not only faithful, it is compelling and timeless.
I say "nothing new under the sun," (a quote from Ecclesiastes 1:9), because this is such a perpetual pattern of the church. A few examples come to mind (though there are many more):
In the fourth and fifth century, when Christianity became accepted by, and subsequently enmeshed with, Roman political authority, many Christians self-exiled to the desert and formed monastic communities (some of which persist in some form), reclaiming the marginal, alternative existence most appropriate to those with the good news that the kingdom of God is encroaching upon the world.
During the Reformations of the 16th and 17th centuries, many felt that Christianity's evolution to Christendom was a betrayal of God's truest self-revelation: a Christ who came in fragile form, preaching and healing, serving and suffering. Jesus betrayed all expectation for the Messiah who would restore God's chosen people to power, yet the Church who bore his name was obsessed with it's own political, economic, social and spiritual power. And so the Reformers called the future church to the form and function of the ancient church, looking to the authority of Scripture and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit for guidance. (Were they successful? Well, that's a doozy of a question for another time).
The point is, the impulse is there and the pattern is familiar. There was something frighteningly compelling about the early Christians, who were, by all accounts, neither rich nor popular nor powerful. What they had, under the best of circumstances, was a way of life, rooted in Jewish tradition but flourishing in diverse ways. And this way of life was compelling enough to grow from an obscure movement to a global community that outlives every empire it encounters.
The question is (as I see it), Do we have the conviction to (again) make this "fourth way" viable, living deeply into our tradition, adopting Christianity as a way of life, even as it may well move us to the margins, not just of society, but of Christianity itself?
posted by Aaron at
5:31 PM
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