Maybe…
I ‘shared’ this quote from my old friend Alan Hirsch on Facebook today but as I’ve pondered some thoughts over the day I’m not so sure the answer is actually a revised ecclesiology more fitting to our time. I think ecclesiology might look past the real problem we face and may provide a superficial fix.
It begs the question ‘what are the 21st C complexities?’ (You might like to elaborate Hirschy?…)
But it was a coffee with a mate this morning that percolated my thinking. So I’ll start to unpack it and you can see what you think.
We don’t live in the 16th century (thank God – or we would probably be burning pro gay advocates at the stake), nor do we live in the 20th century, not even 2014. In his book Kingdom Conspiracy, Scot McKnight describes the latter part of the 20th century as an optimistic era (especially the 80’s) when we believed we were going to ‘take back ground ‘ and make a significant dent in a secular world. From the contemporary church movement to the missional / emerging church we all had an answer.
But… I’m not convinced that in the west we have taken much ground at all or made much of a dent in culture. l can’t speak for other parts of the developing world where the church seems to be growing, but my experience of church in the secular west is that the influence has been more upon us than by us. I would sense we have conformed to the culture more than we have influenced the culture.
Ouch…
The problem may be that we can’t see it… because it’s hard to notice an environment you are immersed in. Our sexual ethics have shifted – and I’m not referring to the gay debate. I doubt there would be many young people ‘waiting for marriage’ these days or even keeping themselves to one partner. The last stats I heard were about 15% ‘wait’. Our economics are decidedly similar to the world around us, and our politics are often similar too. We veer right or left when the kingdom is in fact an alternate reality completely.
One of the oddities we were discussed this morning was the challenge of church attendance in this time. In the 60s and 70s it was twice on Sunday that everyone attended church. In the 80s it was once but we were committed to the once, the 90s started to become fortnightly and the naughties and the 20teens have seen regular attendance pushed out to 3-4 weekly.
Is it ecclesiology that needs to shift to address the reason people aren’t part of the Sunday gathering?
Before I go on my concern is not with ‘attendance’, per se as you can attend a Sunday gig and not be a disciple, but my question is around how we imagine church for the future if this trend continues.
Is it OK to call yourself part of a church (or even ‘The Church’) if you only go once every 5 weeks? 6?… 8?…
What about twice a year?
That’s absurd you say… Maybe… but when does it start to become silly? When do we actually say ‘whoa… time out! ‘?
The conversation we had this morning focussed on the fact that people who were now irregular church attenders were not necessarily floundering disciples. They may well be godly people for whom life has become increasingly complex and they are trying to balance the scales of work, family, friends, kids sport, the need for rest and so on.
So my point is that it’s not poor church attendance that is the problem – rather this is a symptom of how we have been immersed and inculturated into western values – how we have been secularised rather than the community being evangelised.
We need to work hard and provide… And provide well
We need ‘family time’… We need ‘me time’…
Then there are the kids activities that have us chaueffering endlessly… There are extended family to see, friends to catch up with, birthday parties, weddings, and then some days you just don’t feel like getting out of bed on a cold Sunday morning…
With all that ‘life’ going on it seems easier and wiser to eliminate church from our lives rather than anything else. Because ‘church’ won’t complain… church will ‘understand’…
‘How hard for you being so busy… ‘
‘How tricky for you to get time with the family…
And so on…
Reality is it wasn’t this hard 40 years ago.
So the question that arises for me as a Christian leader is ‘are we trying to run with a 20th century form of church in a 21st century world and do we need to seriously grapple with a strong but more fluid approach to church?
Or… do we need to start calling it as the secularisation of the church? Do we need a different expression, or we just need a rocket?
I’d suggest the problem is that we have allowed ourselves to believe that the secularisation we have experienced is just normal life, rather than challenging it and asking how we orient our lives around Jesus call and the community of faith.
The church is no longer central to the life of many Christians as it was 40 years ago. And while there may have been some unhealthy motivations in those days based around guilt and legalism, as well as a very inward focus, now we see a church that is fraying and in danger of either slowly dissolving or re-forming as an anaemic secularised version of itself.
The flip side of this argument is that we must simply adapt to the context we are in and currently the context is that everyone’s life is busy, busy, busy, so we simply can’t expect to do church as we once did.
Perhaps we genuinely have to consider a church that meets sporadically and where the major connections are outside of Sunday? Perhaps we need a shift in imagination that allows us to ‘roll with the punches ‘ in regards to how secular society shapes us and be less concerned with what happens on a Sunday? I don’t see us moving back to the 70s any time soon. So maybe we have to adapt our ecclesiology to suit? I have a pretty low church perspective anyway so that isn’t hard for me. I can meet in homes, I can meet in smaller communities, but… what if people cant commit to participation in groups oriented and scheduled around their busy lives? Because I suggest we will simply see the same problem replicated in the smaller and more fluid environment…
At it’s core the church in its local expression is a community but if people are never together then it cant be a community and by definition can’t be a church either. In his book I referred to earlier McKnight puts Jesus and church as central to the coming of the kingdom and I sense we have allowed church to be a ‘desired’ focus, but not essential.
I don’t believe the problem is ecclesiology. The problem is that we have lost sight of who we are and who we are called to be. Life is complex today – no question – so more than ever we need to draw a line in the sand and in the words of Hauerwas declare ‘Jesus is Lord and everything else is bullshit’, because right now the bullshit seems to be having its way with us.
That’s a dark post I realise. But I’m close to the end of my rope as a leader wondering just how we lead communities where the shape of lives is more dictated by the culture than by the gospel and the call of Jesus.
In the 60’s and 70’s shops were closed on Sundays, WAFL and VFL was played mostly on Saturdays, there were less Muslims. “Homo’s” stayed in the closet. We learned the Catechism and had barbecue’s around a basic hot plate (not an outdoor kitchen). Dad drank Emu Export and there was no boutique beer. Coffee was instant. people smoked in the office at work. Evolution was a theory. It still is but people now believe it is a fact. There were no mega-churches in Perth. Pastors were trained theologians, not CEO’s. The Seekers and singing kum-bah-yah was considered OK or Cool if you were in the newly formed Uniting Church. There was no Internet and kids played outside, There were few fast-food outlets and we cooked a roast on Sundays, Mum did not have to work. Yep, Life has changed.
Great post Hamo and very thought provoking. The ultimate conclusion for me is that if people wanted to be there they would. That’s not just in a consumer sense (although it could be), but in the sense that if peple are able to build worthwhile community (ie relationships that are positive, fun, inspiring – people you actually want to spend time with), engage with others, hopefully get something out of it but also feel like they’re progressing then they’re much more likely to be there.
We often miss church, we have a 1 year old who naps at roughly the same time as the service and it’s a bit inconvenient. We often go just for the chat at the end once he’s woken up, but because that’s the bit we miss if we’re not there, and that’s the place where we can contribute something. And I think that’s what it comes down to for most – do I miss it? Does anyone miss us?
Ideally I think church should shape up so that both we miss it if we’re not there and people miss us if we’re not about – that means we are offered something and we are also invited to bring something along. It’s easier said than done. We run a small group that suffers from people not coming along for lots of reasons – essentially though I think people feel like that, either they don’t miss it or we won’t miss them. It makes progress as a group impossible but I think you’ve just got to keep being aware of it, keep being flexible and build from what you do have to hopefully make a community that is relevant and collaborative. And continually reaching out in real ways to keep meaningful relationship with those struggling to engage in group stuff. Much harder in a Sunday setting than a small group I think.
I’m rambling a bit, but the bottom line has to be discipleship and that’s a journey that can’t be done alone. We find support and encouragement most often comes outside of traditional meetings, when we’re hanging out with kids or having dinner or coffee together. These are the spaces where we can offer more too. Interestingly most of these relationships are with people we’ve met through Sunday church when we were more regular. Regardless of ecclesiology or whatever I think this is where the nitty gritty of real life growth, sharing, accountability happens. It’s easy to skip meetings for good reason or not, and people will always have different wants/needs in regards to larger gatherings, but I think when we start building genuine community that filters into everyday life and is consistent then the question of the meetings becomes a lot less relevant.
(Reading back, not so cohesive, and doesn’t directly address the question of culture, but interested to know your thoughts.)
Yeah that’s good Dave.
I think all of us underestimate how much we are missed when we skip a gathering. And we tend to think ‘we are only one family’ and it won’t matter, but on any given week 20 people think that!