'Emergent' Christians seek spirituality without nasty theological squabbli

[Tippy]

Call it a post-everything faith, or Starbucks spirituality, or the salvation of Protestantism, but the hottest trend in American church life pitched its tent in Nashville last week.

It's called the Emerging Church, a restless spin-off of conservative evangelical Protestantism. They brought their national convention to town, several hundred people. The message was everywhere: Let's drop the battle axes, learn from other churches (even Catholics) and enjoy the adventure of discerning God's message in this strange world called the 21st century.

They were dressed for it — fiercely casual. Some presenters were clad in shorts and sandals. Some participants wore T-shirts declaring "Disciples Make Better Lovers."

snip>
So Emergent worship evokes spiritual imagination (using candles, darkness, art work on curtained walls). It is interactive (some churches have couches, not pews). It engages the body (a Minneapolis congregation offers yoga and massage therapy). Emergent leaders value Holy Communion and Bible reading. They're willing to praise liberals (sometimes) for promoting biblical values of justice that conservatives denied for decades <snip

<http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050528/NEWS06/505280346/1001>

[SpiralHawk]

1. Muiy Interesante !

The Aquarian impulse (eclectic and freedom loving, intellectual and non-judgemental) overlaps the waning Piscean impulse (martyr or persecutor; mystic or madman).

[Wright Patman]

30. 'This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius'

was what the Fifth Dimension sang circa 1970.

I've been waiting 35 years for the "New Age" to begin, but things just keep getting worse.

Oh well. It was still a cool song even if peace doesn't guide the planets and love steer the stars.

[KittyWampus]

42. As The Sun Begins To Rise In Aquarius In Springtide Rather Than Pisces

Western Religion has incorporated the Astrological Symbology as The Sun travel round the ecliptic.

When Sun rose in Taurus, God was depicted as a Bull
When in Aries, a Ram
When in Pisces, a Fish

As it enters Aquarius the symbology is an Angel.

Esoterically, this refers to Humanity evolving past Homo Sapien to Homo Spiritualis... or the Fully Aware Man.

Right now Humanity is stuck in Intellectual Awareness.

[TreasonousBastard]

2. I guess I can live with that...

although I don't know just what it means.

[ima_sinnic]

3. whatever. the sheeple running to the latest guru-type fad.

seeking, always seeking, that "something" that they think they're going to find outside of themselves. the charlatans are capitalizing on New Age claptrap while leading the idiots down the path of "salvation."

[VegasWolf]

40. Exactly, spirituality, the first baby step one takes after breaking away

from an organizied religion. Sheeples wandering lost just
waiting for someone to guide them.

[Bob3]

4. Alas Nasty theological squabbles are part of the deal

with any organized religion. A lot of Paul's letter's are in the don't do that do this mode. Heck even Buddhism has factions. Tibetan, Zen whatever.

[knight_of_the_star]

48. Not the same thing

In that case the factions are more cultural than theological.

[bitchkitty]

49. Paul was an asshole.

No doubt about it - and a control freak. I'm always very suspicious of anyone who talks to God, but nobody else is around to verify that the conversation took place.

[dogday]

5. My Grandmother was an Honest-To-God Christian

That woman never stopped talking about God and Jesus and lived every moment for them. She was the greatest woman in the world to me.

[BrotherBuzz]

28. My Grandmother was an honest-to-God Christian, too,...

but she never talked about God or Jesus unless those subjects were the topic of discussion. Rather, she spent every moment living a Christian life. Morals and ethics were to be learned from her just by observing.

[Vickers]

33. "she spent every moment living a Christian life"

Sadly, that part has fallen out of favor these days.

[slamthecrank]

39. awesome

wasn't it Jesus who taught not to "flaunt" your religion, and Paul that said "they will know you by the way you love each other"?

Nowadays, it's "they will know you are Christians by how big, shiny, and 'hip' your church is."

I'm just continuously amused by the silly church names they come up with to make them sound important and "hip".

[Javaman]

6. So is Amen replaced with...

Alright?

Can I have an ALRIGHT? I can't hear you, CAN I HAVE AN ALRIGHT!

ALRIGHT!!!

[Zhade]

18. I just got an image of Fonzie as a preacher.

"Brothers and sisters: AYYYYYYYYY!"

[GettysbergII]

32. Love that How the DLC Does It link. Thanks

[Zhade]

35. I love that I can share the facts about the DLC's rightwing nature.

I'm even happier when people notice the truth. So thank you for reading it!

[Jackpine Radical]

43. This DLC info deserves its own link.

If you haven't done so, it oughtta go into GD Politics or somewhere & then move to a more estended life in one of the "lesser" (slower-moving) forums (fora?). (Pardon all the parenthetical comments. Sometimes I just can't help myself.)

[Zhade]

44. Hey, no problem. (I do it too.)

This has been posted a couple of times. Interestingly, none of the resident DLCers could be found to defend their precious organization's connections to far-rightists like the Koch brothers.

I figured putting it in my signature would assure there would be no threadjacking to shut down any discussion of these facts - and since I have a big mouth, the link gets seen in lots of posts in lots of forums.

Much as some would like, there is no covering up THIS truth about the DLC.

[colorado_ufo]

38. Worse yet . . .

"Alright" isn't even a word, although I see it everywhere now. Properly, it is, "All right." Literally, "all" (everything) is "right" (or correct).

[Javaman]

41. It's now accepted as part of the modern vinatuclar...such as...

Many people feel that pronouncing "heigth" as opposed to "height" is correct, also saying "death" as opposed to "deaf" is also very popular. Both, I believe, show incredible ignorance of the English language.

And just for grins...

Alright adv: All Right

Source: Websters dictionary.

[Maat]

47. New-Thought-ers, of which I am one, say,

"And it is so!" at the end of a prayer, instead of "Amen."

New Thought Churches ..
Religious Science (of which I am a member),
Unity.

[Book Lover]

7. You know, for a former Catholic

that "even Catholics" line is really torquing me off.

[murray hill farm]

10. me too!

Catholics were the origional christians, after all!

[MountainLaurel]

11. The issue is

That most evangelical and fundamentalist churches in this country consider Catholics to be Mary-worshipping idolators, and not true Christians. I think the comment is meant to be more of a commentary on those sorts of hate-filled evangelical teachings than on Catholicism itself.

[Book Lover]

13. Oh, I know why

That does not preclude my annoyance at the left-handed comment.

[DemBones DemBones]

15. I know how you feel; I feel the same way. With two words,

the author has stupidly made these "emergent Christians" sound as if they basically share the anti-Catholicism of the least tolerant of Protestants, the sort of people who will literally attend a Klan rally on Saturday night and be at church on Sunday morning, the glad-handing, back-slapping good ole boys who view Catholics as they view Jews and blacks, through lenses that distort reality.

"Hey, did you guys hear that about these "emergent Christians"? They think Christians can learn something from the Mary-worshipers?" (Laughter, snorts of derision.)

. . .

Many people are unaware that the Klan was founded to "protect" good white Protestants from Catholics and Jews as much as from blacks. Anti-Catholicism has been the core of the bigotry of "Know-Nothings" and other nativists.

Too many leftists fail to realize the danger of anti-Catholic thought, the depth of the prejudice among even the most mainstream Protestants.

I have seen it in Presbyterian, Episcopalian, and Methodist churches as well as in Baptist churches. I've even seen it among Quakers and Unitarians.

Anti-Catholicism is something I have always taken note of, just as I've always noticed anti-Semitic, racist, and sexist comments, though only the sexism stepped on my own toes. Sometimes I spoke out about these expressions of decidedly uncharitable thought, often I just said nothing and changed the subject. As I grew older, I grew bolder about calling people to task when they made biased and rude remarks.

Because the prejudice concerned me, I educated myself about Catholicism and always felt destined to be Catholic, though I was middle-aged before I finally took the step.

In the fifteen years I've been Catholic, I've seen more anti-Catholicism than ever before. I fear it's increasing and leftists are too often a part of it. It's often argued that prejudice against a majority is impossible yet everyone on the left acknowledges that sexism is a serious problem, despite the fact that women slightly outnumber men.

[Zhade]

19. Bigotry against Catholics for being Catholic is wrong.

Criticizing Ratzinger and his cover-up of child rape and other rightwing policies of the RCC is, of course, not bigotry (just throwing that out there to remind people of the difference).

Can you explain the term "nativist" to me? Interestingly, I've been laughably smeared with this here, and I don't even know what the term means.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

25. Nativist=anti-immigrant, and in its original nineteenth century

usage, particularly against Irish and other Catholic immigrants.

[Zhade]

26. Ahhh, I felt it must be something like that.

Well, that clears it up - since I am not opposed to immigrants, Irish Catholic or otherwise, the DUer who claimed I was is a complete fucking idiot.

Thanks for clueing me in!

[CTyankee]

21. Um, Quakers and Unitarians?

Quakers can be hard assed about pacifism, granted. But I doubt very seriously that Unitarians would be anti-Catholic, in the sense that they would discriminate against a person for just being a Catholic. They might take issue with some Catholic doctrine, but I don't see them participating in blind prejudice against someone just because of that person's religous beliefs.

[Zhade]

23. They don't, as far as I know.

Remember: sometimes one person's legitimate criticism is another's excuse to falsely claim bigotry.

YMMV.

[Mythsaje]

24. With all due respect

to your personal faith...

Where I find little fault with Catholics themselves (as much as I find with members of any Christian sect) there are numerous examples of how the Mother Church herself has done immeasurable evil in the interests of spreading her dogma across the known world. Evil that John Paul BARELY touched upon when he apologized to the Jews.

We could start with the system destruction of the Gnostics, the Knights Templar, and a host of other "heresies" we've probably never heard of, as well as innumerable pagan cultures all over the world.

We could talk about the sheer monolithic wealth of the Catholic Church, how it was acquired, and how it's been kept.

We could talk about the priest molestation scandals, and how Mother Church hid them away from the public for years. If not centuries.

This has little to do with protestant hatred of the Church, and Catholics in general, but it might do something to explain the distrust and dislike felt by others.

[Kathy in Cambridge]

45. Well, this explains everything

"In the fifteen years I've been Catholic, I've seen more anti-Catholicism than ever before."

As a lifelong Catholic, I've experienced very little prejudice, and could certainly NEVER measure it on the same scale as racism and sexism. That's an apples and oranges analogy.

[beam me up scottie]

46. Hmmmm,

I've always wanted to be persecuted, are you saying that converting to Catholicism is not a good choice?
Could you perhaps recommend another religion whose followers are more often the targets of bigotry?

[reprobate]

8. Could this be showing that there are a lot of religious people who are....

...just getting fed up with the fundamentalists?

[Tippy]

12. I was wondering the same thing when I read the article

It will be interesting to see if other Religions will accept this group especially in the south.

[Lars39]

16. I've recently gotten to know a Jehovah's Witness.

Nice lady, totally apolitical, said she thinks the anti-Christ is among us now,
and that people will turn against religion, and the religious.

[Tux]

9. 21st Century Christians

Thought they all wanted to return to the dark Ages.

Some things of interest from their site (http://www.emergingchurch.org/)

today's mission context provides the church with a chance to:

1. shake off any residual "leave it to beaver" orientation and begin swimming (even with a paddleboard) within the postmodern culture.

2. really trust the power of the gospel and learn to communicate it with authenticity, because for postmodern people, authenticity is primary.

churches of the spirit are confident, loving and brave enough to provide for the exit as well as the entrance of seekers! real doors are thresholds. a door with a way in, but with no way out, is not really a door, but a trap. the church is not in the business of trapping, but of flowing with the spirit as it moves in peoples' lives.

Site is run by a GenXer who said this: "UNIX rocks!" A church that makes sense.

[cprise]

17. capitalization = sin !

:)

Seriously, is this a load of verbal diarrhea or what:

being an "atari xer," it took me awhile to figure out my indifference to "really huge" churches, and to understand the need of those ten years my elder to build them...

Er, OK.... And then there the rest of the site with the word postmodern plunked into every third sentence without any sign of comprehending the term. As far as I can tell, the site is talking about fashion and style, not philosophy.

The "ethos" page has no values on it that I can discern.

Please excuse the irreveance of my Mixed-Case.

[Zhade]

20. What does "with authenticity" mean, exactly?

I'm not certain what they mean by that.

Tux, if I'm wrong please forgive me, but as I recall you're one of the Christians around here that doesn't buy into the myths most Christians do (virgin birth, the divinity of Jesus, miracles, etc). Do you see this group moving away from the (IMHO obviously untrue) adaptations of other myths to Christianity? It seems more like UU than traditional Christian mythology.

You clearly see this as positive - do you think the myth-making will phase out over the coming centuries, to a point where the purported message of Jesus will once again be the important factor in calling oneself a Christian, rather than the need by many believers to insist that the unprovably impossible is literally true?

I for one would welcome such a return to truth as expressed by the words attributed to Jesus rather than so many of his followers.

[supernova]

14. Good for them

This sounds quite promising actually. Most of the early churches weren't churches at all, just informal gatherings and study groups in people's homes. This movement seems to harken back to that.

I will follow this with interest.

It might be right that the time of fundamentalist influence is waning, which would be a good thing.

[Zhade]

22. Agreed - before the myths were the truths.

You know - love your fellows, take care of each other, feel the divine inside you.

This seems like a return to the original Christianity to this atheist.

[megatherium]

29. That's what Jesus told his followers:

feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick. Love God and love your neighbor. (When asked who our neighbors are, Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan, who helped an injured Jew even though Samaritans and Jews hated each other.) Jesus never said "believe in doctrine X or go to the hot place!" In fact, some of his parables stressed the importance of charity over belief.

But I would suggest there were the miracles at the beginning too, or at least the strong belief in these. It appears that belief in the resurrection of Jesus was present at the beginning of the church: Paul taught this (1 Corinthians 15, written before 60 AD), and he was converted early on (within 10 years after Jesus' death in 28 or 30 AD). To the followers of Jesus, his resurrection signified that they need not fear death, that God would be with them before, during and after their own deaths. Whatever it was they believed, the immediate followers of Jesus were willing to suffer martyrdom for their faith. None of this proves anything, of course, but it does indicate that belief in the resurrection wasn't some sort of later legend or myth (arising many decades later), as is commonly supposed.

[Zhade]

31. Sorry, belief in miracles does not provide evidence of same.

That we have been told through 2,000 years of politically-motivated and just plain wrong translations that some early followers of Jesus might have believed in miracles is not evidence that such miracles actually happened.

Could they have? Well, not based on any evidence we have (hearsay is not scientific evidence).

Maybe one day we'll be able to find evidence that shows the virgin birth, divinity of Jesus, and miracles actually happened. Right now we're still trying to nail down if Jesus even actually existed or not.

Jury's still out on all of it, but I do like the purported teachings of Jesus. IMHO, that's the thing believers should focus on, not trying to prove something they know they can't prove at this point in time.

YMMV.

[megatherium]

34. All too true.

I'm not sure if I believe any of this myself. (Actually, I don't believe in the virgin birth; unlike the resurrection, it does appear that belief in the virgin birth surfaced later, after 60 AD. Only Luke and Matthew have nativity stories, which don't seem to agree with each other; and Paul never mentions the virgin birth.) I'm a liberal Episcopalian, actually.

This reminds me of something I read some time ago: somebody did a survey of scientists to determine how many of them believe in the paranormal, and if they do, why. Turns out those scientists (20% if memory serves) who believe in the paranormal tend not to believe based on their knowledge of the parapsychology literature but rather on their own personal experiences. I suppose religious faith is the same way. If you've had your own (necessarily subjective) experience of the transcendent, you're willing to have faith in these sort of things. Myself, once or twice I honestly believe I may have experienced the Holy Spirit acting in my life. Of course, I cannot expect you or anyone else to believe in anything on that basis.

[Zhade]

36. There's also that little "virgin" mistranslation thing.

If I recall correctly, it meant the equivalent of "maiden", not a literal virgin.

As far as personal experiences go, it's very probable that those experiences are all in one's head. Whether that mind-bound experience is connected to Something Else is a question not yet answered. I've had entheogenic experiences, and I can't say for sure that there isn't more out there.

I mean, hey, I'm an atheist, but I don't think we know all there is to know. There may come a day we can prove that gods, unicorns, ESP powers and ghosts exist. I'm all for learning as much as we can about the universe - I just don't accept someone insisting that something they cannot possibly prove at this time is literally, factually true. It very well may not be, no matter how much faith someone has.

Thanks for the thoughtful replies, and not taking offense to mine.

[megatherium]

37. and thank you likewise, for your thoughtful replies to me. nt

[Initech]

27. Wow, that sounds like a Christian Grateful Dead concert.

And I didnt even think such a thing was possible.

[noel711]

50. laughing my ass off at you guys...

This is the best place on the internets.
This "Emergent" church ought to go "demerge.'
They are nothing new... These days we have Lite, Beer, Lite soda,
so how about Lite Religion.
Let's just gather 'round, and have some fun, and only look at the things we like about "faith."
Just like Lite Beer, less filling...
Just like Lite soda, no substance,
but where the rubber hits the road, when disease, and death rear thier lovely heads.... who ya gonna call? Reverend LIte?

[Blue_Tires]

51. why is this 'let's all get along' attitude new?

haven't the unitarians been doing it for awhile already?