Prodigal Kiwi(s) Blog

The Human Side of Church: Group Processes in Congregations

Paul writes – I came across some interesting thinking by Dr. Sara Savage recently. It’s an excerpt from the book The Human Face of the Church: A Social Psychology and Pastoral Theology Resource for Pioneer and Traditional Ministry by Sara Savage and Eolene Boyd-Macmillan. You can listen to an interesting interview between Sara Savage and Alan Roxburgh here. She's reflecting on Mission in Western Culture.

Also interesting was this brief (Dec. 2006) Church Times article by Sara, The Darker Side of Parish Life, though it needs to be remembered that when we are talking about the “darker side of parish life”, we’re talking about the “dark side”, the shadow that is characteristic of each of us. Thus transformation at the level of a parish church begins, and continues alongside the transformative work of the Spirit in the hearts and lives of individuals; when our darkness and brokenness is healed.

Here’s the excerpt:

“…The sociologist Max Weber observed a cyclical process among religious movements that he called ‘the routinization of charisma’. Weber argued that any great vision requires a human process to carry it through time, sometimes in the form of ‘a man, a mission, a movement, or a monument’. Even with the Body of Christ, the life-giving charism has to be embodied in a routine – in some form of human organization. Yet, life-giving visions do not fit easily into neat boxes. So, the very process that gives the vision continuing life also begins to kill it. When the maintenance of the institution (which protects the charism) becomes the institution’s primary purpose, the death of the charism is on the horizon. Only a spiritual revival or reform will re-ignite the gift. In our era, fresh expressions of church and the re-traditioning of familiar forms of church march alongside many initiatives to re-ignite the gift…”

As I read this I recalled a very similar line of thought woven through a very interesting talk given by Pope Benedict XVI, New Outpourings of the Spirit: Movements in the Church. Reform, and new “movements” are an important and historically precedented means of “re-ignit[ing] the gift” (‘charism’) that the church offers to the world (i.e. recovering the reality of the church as a “sacrament to the world”; the means of enabling God to be present to human beings in “visible tangible form”). Maybe too, new “movements” will also “recover” the charism by initiating new and contextual forms (and ways) of being church…?

Discernment

Paul writes – Maggi Dawn recently offered some good thoughts on personal discernment that draw on the very helpful Ignatian tradition. She writes:

“…Ignatius defines consolation as "Every increase in faith, hope and love, and all interior joy that invites and attracts to what is heavenly, and to the salvation of our soul, by filling it with peace and quiet in its Creator and Lord."   

Desolation, he says, is "What is entirely the opposite of consolation … darkness of soul, turmoil of spirit, inclination to what is low and earthly, restlessness arising from many disturbances which lead to lack of faith, lack of hope, and lack of love. The soul is wholly slothful, tepid, sad, and separated, as it were, from its Creator and Lord."

Maggi tells of a friend who called on her recently when he was making some decisions in relation to his own life. Her advice included the following, which draws on Ignatian principles:

"Regardless of what is sensible, and regardless of what you think you "ought" to do, which of the courses ahead of you makes you feel alive, makes your heart open wider, makes you feel hopeful and as if the future is opening up not closing down? That is the route you should go."

Rowan Williams on Mary, bearer of good news

Paul writes - Rowan Williams, The Archbishop of Canterbury offers a beautiful sermon, delivered at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes at the International Mass of 24 September 2008 (the feast of Our Lady of Walsingham). The sermon has that wonderful Anglican focus on Jesus, and a deep appreciation of the role of Mary, much neglected in Protestantism generally, and many would say plain wrong (in many respects) in Roman Catholicism. 

His Scriptural text includes the following lines:

'The babe in my womb leaped for joy.'  (Luke 1.44)

Here’s an excerpt from the sermon.

“…It's very tempting to think of mission as something to be done in the same way we do – or try to do – so much else, with everything depending on planning and assessments of how we're doing, and whether the results are coming out right.  For that matter, it's tempting to think of the Church's whole life in these sorts of terms.  Of course we need to use our intelligence, we need to be able to tell the difference between good and bad outcomes, we need to marshal all the skill and enthusiasm we can when we respond to God's call to share his work of transforming the world through Jesus and his Spirit.  But Mary's mission tells us that there is always a deeper dimension, grounded in the Christ who is at work unknown and silent, reaching out to the deeply buried heart of each person and making the connection; living faithfully at the heart of the Church itself, in the middle of its disasters and betrayals and confusions, still giving himself without reserve.  All that we call 'our' mission depends on this; and if we are wise, we know that we are always going to be surprised by the echoes and connections that come to life where we are not expecting it…”

You can read the full sermon here. For Evangelicals looking to engage the question of Mary, I would recommend Scot McKnight’s book, The Real Mary: Why Evangelical Christians Can Embrace the Mother of Jesus…

Killed while trying to rescue a female colleague who was being attacked.

Paul writes – Very sad news yesterday evening. A long-time, 45-year old business colleague was murdered.

“…Witnesses said a Pacific Island woman was punched by a man in the car park of what is believed to be a call centre where she works on Mills Lane, metres from Queen St, about 5.30pm.A colleague coming out of the lift came to help her. The offender stabbed the man in the chest and ran off. Police were still looking for him last night…”

You can read an initial newspaper story here. His name has not yet been released.

Please pray for his family (wife and teenage children), immediate and extended, his many friends, and for his work colleagues past and present. This will be very very difficult news for them to hear later this morning. He was incredibly well respected and liked.

Mark Berry on Bishop Nazir-Ali on "the emerging church movement"

Paul writes – Mark Berry has put up an interesting post responding to some comments by Church of England Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali about “the emerging church movement. Here are a couple of excerpts:

“…I have a few questions/concerns about the Bishops [CofE Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali] words... firstly when we talk of Network Churches let us try to get beyond the consumerist language and culture that has been so embraced by the Church. Network church refers not to niche clubs but to finding a way to be together as community, connected to the wider network of communities and followers of Christ…

We live more networked lives, we may work in a place away from our housing, we move far more frequently and continue to sustain social relationships beyond our immediate locale, we may have family spread across the country, even the world etc. etc

If anything I see network churches seeking to move away from this consumerism and theologically/stylistically bound model and to be far more relational and diverse in expression. 

…In my years exploring these "emerging church movements" I have found the people involved to be far more aware of the wider riches and wisdom of Christian and other spirituality than any other experience I've had of Church and Christians... every other expression/denomination etc. seems intent on proving itself to be the right one... the real expressions of emerging church that I have experienced are far less focused on being right and far more interested in seeing the possibilities for change...”

You can read the whole post here.

Prof. Timothy Gorringe on Missiology in a culture of dispossession

Paul writes – Ben Edson helpfully shares some of the output of what he describes as a “fascinating meeting… Timothy Gorringe, Professor of Theology at Exeter University… Prof. Gorringe was reflecting on missiology in a culture of dispossession…” I’m sure it would have been fascinating. I’ve heard Gorringe lecture and have a few of his books – he’s a wonderful thinker.

Ben posts his notes (six-points in relation to contemporary mission) under the heading: Missiology in a culture of dispossession. Like Ben, much resonates in these notes for me. The content is differing and various ways is a consistent strand through many posts that appear on this blog – themes like: longing, desire, depth, meaning making, life and aliveness, counter-narratives and subversion, embodying alternative ways of being human and community, and the naming of “good news” (this is more than simply a recital of “Christ died for your sins etc.” It’s more deeply contextual and the result of deep listening). 

Here’s Ben’s final 3-points:

4.           Depth - Human beings are deep-water creatures that die in the shallows. Faith needs to be of a depth that people need. We cannot have that depth if the issue of justice is ducked...

5.           Life - Where is the life in the church? [We might want to ask what it means in practice for the church, for local churches to be sources of life in their local contexts…? When so many churches appear “dead” or “dying” what might resurrection-life look, feel, sound, smell and taste like – can life re-emerge out of seeming death? Paul] Life attracts people; worship needs to energise people for life.

6.           Resistance - The church must become a community of resistance. A community that subverts the cultural norm, a community that dismantles the dominant consciousness and offers an alternative to it.

You can read his first three points here. Does anyone know if Gorringe has any new books on these themes underway? Is his Furthering Humanity: A Theology of Culture worth reading…?

Quitting Church: Why the Faithful are Fleeing and What to do About It

Alan writes – While I have yet to read it (thus this isn’t a review or necessarily a recommendation), I was interviewed as part of the research done by the author in preparing to write her recently US-published book titled: Quitting Church: Why the Faithful are Fleeing and What to do About It. It is written by Julia Duin, and was published on the 1^st September by Baker.

I will write a review in due course.

The publisher blurb says:

“Several recent studies reveal that churches across America are hemorrhaging--they are losing members at a life-threatening rate. Intrigued and disturbed by what appears to be an epidemic, Julia Duin, a religion reporter for the Washington Times, amassed research on the issue, interviewed many who have left church, and attended numerous churches in hopes of making sense of this phenomenon. Quitting Church reveals the startling findings of her research. It explains to church leaders why this mass exodus is happening--and what can be done to reverse it. Beginning with the cold, hard facts, Duin then takes readers through a number of issues that influence a person's decision to leave the church, including irrelevancy, hidden suffering, family-centric programming that leaves singles out, impersonal or bland worship services, a lack of biblical literacy, and much more. This eye-opening book will be essential reading for pastors, ministry leaders, and churchgoers who wish to bring these disenchanted Christians back into their midst.”

A PDF of Chapter 1 can be found here. [Paul writes, having read chapter one, its perhaps worth commenting that this has the feel of good entry level title, one that will introduce the key themes and patterns around church leaving… particularly in a US-context. However, to the degree that US-approaches to church (practices, values, and ‘liturgy’) have been imported into countries like NZ, then the observations made will have a certain resonance and familiarity). If the rest of the book reads similarly, then it might be a useful introductory read ahead of the books listed below – although Chrysalis is written for a general readership too, and likewise is a good introduction, though this time to the way that healthy faith changes and grows]

For those wanting to do more reading in this area, the following titles will be useful. Also, I’ve written a number of short essays that can be found here (scroll down for online versions):

1.           A Churchless Faith by Alan Jamieson.

2.           Church Leavers: Faith Journey’s Five Years On by Alan Jamieson

3.           Chrysalis by Alan Jamieson.

4.           The Church and the DeChurched: Mending a Damaged Faith by Mary Tuomi Hammond.

5.           Leaving Church: A Memoir of Faith by Barbara Brown Taylor.

6.           Gone for Good? Church Leaving and Returning in the 21^st Century by Leslie J. Francis and Philip Richter.

Also worth visiting is the Spirited Exchanges (NZ) website which has copies of the newsletters (PDF’s) that were published. 

Acedia and Me – A New Book from Kathleen Norris

Paul writes – Thanks to Maggi Dawn for directing me to the fact that Kathleen Norris has a new book out (Sept 08). Specifically she directed me to Dennis Okholm’s review of Norris’ Acedia & Me: Marriage, Monks, and a Writers Life. I’ve been a fan of Norris since the publication of the excellent The Cloister Walk in 1997 - Read on the heals of my first encounter with Merton and his Seven Storey Mountain. From there I went backwards to the beautiful and haunting Dakota: A Spiritual Geography, then forward to Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith.   

Okholm concludes his review with these words:

“…We urgently need such reminders amid the "restless boredom, frantic escapism, commitment phobia, and enervating despair" of contemporary life, particularly in the context of a marriage such as the one that unfolds in this book. In a society where acedia results in relationships that are recycled more often than aluminum cans, Norris insists that what is most likely to maintain a marriage is not giddy romance but discipline, martyrdom, and obedience (which, at its etymological root, refers to hearing): "The very nature of marriage means saying yes before you know what it will cost. You may say the 'I do' of the wedding ritual in all sincerity, but it is the testing of that vow over time that makes you married…"

You can read his whole review, here.

A Journalist's Journey with the New Calvinists

Paul writes - NZ Anglican priest Peter Carrell reflects (a little) on a new US-book title, Young, Restless, Reformed: A Journalist's Journey with the New Calvinists by Collin Hansen.

“…What makes today’s young Calvinists tick? Collin Hansen investigates the Reformed resurgence among young evangelicals, talking to the leading pastors and theologians of this growing movement. He uncovers common threads in their diverse testimonies and suggests what the church might look like when these young evangelicals become tomorrow’s leaders…”

Prologue and Chapter 1 temporarily here.

Peter asks some good questions and wonders if we need something other than a return to Reformed Calvinism:

“…But the bigger question to me is not the growth of new Calvinism, but the question of whether there is another formulation of Christian teaching which has a wider reach into the world of 2008. It is good that people are crowding into churches to hear the Word of God preached tuliptically, but what about the greater number of people who are not drawn in by Calvinism (nor by its similarly growing-in-popularity Catholic counterpart, the Latin Mass)? We can celebrate that which is good within Calvinism - I suggest - while also wondering whether there is an expression of the gospel, which is even better, suited to the world today!”

I wonder with Peter. I also wonder if the appeal of Calvinism to younger people is similar to my own formative Jesus-following days. I was looking for what I thought was a solid grounding in the Christian faith, a doctrinal grounding. So my early years were spent absorbed by what one friend referred to as “dead authors” – the English Puritans, Jonathan Edwards, (the very much alive) JI. Packer, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Calvin etc. It both grounded me and gave content to my faith, but it isn’t the place that I stayed. My journey broadened; it became more contemporary; it appreciated the diversity and richness of the Christian tradition (and theological thinking) and found a way of holding that diversity and richness together within the Anglican tradition.

So while it might be needful for some, I think it’s a journey that will throw up the same (or similar) questions many of us discovered latent within Calvinism – questions of spirituality (and spiritual formation), questions of the Spirit, questions around the place of Jesus and the Gospels, questions of prayer, questions of mission and cultural engagement, (what has come to be known as) practical theology, questions around what it means to be church, questions themselves and the place of doubt in faith development and growth, and the place of embodied and enacted love. 

Perhaps the supposed “resurgence” is needful for many, but I’m not convinced (on a wider front) that it is a way forward into uncharted territory and the missional questions that are being thrown up in these Post-Christendom times. 

You can read Peter’s full post here.

Exile and Cadences of Something More in relation to church…

Paul writes – Following on from Thursday’s post in which I talked about the reality that many who struggle with churches (as they are) and thus with belonging etc, “like Israel in the wilderness discover that this marginal experience is often (for them) a needful part of a change or growth cycle, one that Walter Brueggemann names as: orientation, disorientation and new orientation. While (to my mind) Alan Roxburgh talks about it in terms of: stability, discontinuity, Disembedding, transition, and re-formation.” I said that this “marginal experience [provides] a space in which to grapple with core questions about church and its purpose.”

Len Hjalmarson helpfully picks up “six points of connection between the circumstance of exile and scriptural resources” from Walter Brueggemann’s excellent book Cadences of Home.  Again, I think these are insightful and relevant to the experience and journey of those struggling with church.

1.           Exiles must grieve their loss and express their resentful sadness about what was and now is not and never will be again… Churches must be communities of honest sadness, naming the losses. The obvious resource…is Lamentations.

2.           Exile is an act of being orphaned [where] there is no sure home. I suggest the term rootlessness. Exiles need to take with them old habits, old customs, old memories, [and] old photographs. The scriptural resources… are the genealogies that have seemed so boring. Two easy access points are (a) the Matthean genealogy… (b) The recital in Hebrews 11 of all our family “by faith.”

You can read Len’s full post, and the rest of the six points here. Thanks Len.