New Ways of Being Church

Just got back from spending three days in Louisville, KY at a conference focused on New Ways of Being Church. Featured speakers were: Diana Butler Bass, Marcus Borg and Brian McLaren. Earlier posts contain some soundbites from their presentations.

All the speakers seem to agree upon two points which have major repercussions for faith communities. Personally, I find both exciting. But others find them quite disturbing and even frightening. If Butler Bass, Borg & McLaren are correct, it means that to be effective (or even survive) congregations have to do church a whole new way.

Point 1:
Our "Christian culture" has shifted to a "secular" or "pluralistic" culture, meaning that many people attend church out of an intentional desire to follow Christ rather than because church attendance is expected.

Conventional Christians want church to be an unchallenging environment that mirrors the conventions of the surrounding culture. Conventional Christians have no desire to change themselves or society.

Intentional Christians want to be lead closer to God and in doing so to be challenged to lead genuinely Christ like lives. Intentional Christians yearn for personal change and societal change.

Intentional Christians find conventional churches to be shallow, unspiritual and even hypocritical. Conventional Christians find intentional churches threatening to their entire belief systems.

Point 2:
Spiritual focus needs to shift from the suffering and death of Jesus for an individual's sins to Jesus' declaration of the coming of the Kingdom of God.

All the speakers agreed on this, and this is their most controversal claim. For the last 1500 years, Christianity's focus has primarily been other worldly: We follow Christ to avoid hell and get into heaven. The primary goal of the church is to get more people into heaven and help everyone avoid hell. Believing in the right things became more important than doing the right things.

The speakers called for a new reformation based on practice not belief, focused on following Jesus in this world as opposed to following him to the next world. They envisioned a Christian community steeped in prayer and worship, committed to social justice and peace, defined by hospitality and who take as their foundational commandment to love God and love neighbor.