Tuesday 2 October 2012

Two authors on the future church

As is probably apparent from a couple of recent posts, I've been reading Mike Riddell's 1998 book Threshold of the Future.  Riddell is a New Zealander, and (if dim memory serves me right) spent some time teaching at my old school, Hamilton Boys High, during my time there, before moving on to become a Baptist minister, then a theologian of some note, holding positions at both Auckland and Otago universities, and providing intellectual grunt to the so-called "emerging church" movement both in this country and internationally.  At the time he wrote he was still teaching theology at Otago, and still identified with the progressive element within the Baptist communion.

There's a lot to admire about Riddell's honesty in Threshold.  He saw clearly the impending end of Christianity as we know it, and the need to find a radical solution before we reach the point of no return.  In the end however he was able to provide no satisfactory strategies or suggestions, other than a variation on self-indulgent house churches - a very Baptist thing to propose - along with (at least this is my impression) a retreat from intellectual rigour.  It is always easier to identify a problem than resolve the issues, and the issues that are undermining the Christian world view are Herculean.

Given that Riddell wrote well over a decade ago, I was amazed to find that not long after writing the book he had resigned from his position at Otago, walking off the battlefield to reinvent himself as a Catholic layperson.

At the same time I've been reading Gerald Kieschnick's Waking the Sleeping Giant.  Kieschnick was at the time (2009) president of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod.  He too writes about taking the church (specifically the LCMS) into the future, though unlike Riddell he was quite happy to rearrange the deck chairs rather than countenance anything even remotely radical.

Kieschnick was a victim of 9/11 in an indirect way.  Despite impeccable credentials as a rather naive conservative himself, the even more wooden-headed fundamentalists and myopic legalists in the Synod found him wanting because he authorised a representative of the Synod to participate in an inter-faith gathering at Yankee Stadium to - horror of horrors - offer prayers for the those who died.  This, according to the hard-liners, was "unionism" (a term with a specific meaning in the LCMS relating to doctrinal compromise) and "syncretism".

Though Kieschnick was scarcely 'liberal' or 'progressive', he was brought down by reactionaries in the Synod, and replaced by the mustachioed 'Darth Vader' of the sect, Matthew Harrison.

Facing up to the need for change can be a dangerous thing.  The church is undeniably change resistant.  It may suffer a little tinkering about with its worship patterns, but you get anywhere near a nerve - even when it's necessary to save its life - and the beast will bellow and likely trample you.

The Missouri Synod is, thank God, atypical, and arguably now has the leadership it deserves.  But the 'emerging church', quite a different kettle of fish, has also been largely unsuccessful in bringing about substantive or systemic change.  What do they both have in common?

Perhaps "too little, too late."

7 comments:

  1. Probably. But the 64k question (not allowing for inflation)is: So what c/should be done?

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  2. Christianity is DONE! They may not know that yet or never even thought about it but it has been caught out and exposed, debunked and dismissed as a superstition. No matter how they re-work the old stories into allegory or metaphor or put on a new mask, the old face has already been seen and it's too late to cover it up now.

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    1. Maybe in your house, Corky, but I wouldn't be rejoicing if I were you just yet.....

      BB

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    2. Would you suggest I wait until after I die to rejoice? One thing is for sure, nobody is going to return from the dead to expose the perpetrators and the perpetuation of an ancient myth. That's why the religious con-game is the safest con-game in town - it cannot be falsified. Well, not until after death anyway when it's too late and won't ever even know that it was all a lie. It won't matter then - it only matters now, while one is alive to appreciate it.

      It appears that the US government is fast moving toward a one party system, the Christian right, maybe if and when that happens people will appreciate the fact that creating a Christian dictatorship was a bad idea.

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    3. you know Corky, for once you could be right. It is therefore yet another sign of the imminent return of Christ....

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  3. Corky, I'm curious as to whether you believe that the USA was a Christian dictatorship at any point in its history? How would you describe life in the USA during the first, second, and third "Great Awakenings"? Tolerable, reasonable freedom, hell on earth?

    I flirted with anarchy during one point in my life. (Didn't everyone who ever suffered under the "Christian" dictatorship of HWA?) Gradually, with more thought and experience, I began to realize that (gasp!) laws protected my right to be an anarchist, and that a certain number of laws and/or ethics actually acted in a positive manner to preserve the most important freedoms. These days, I tend to view many of the Christian precepts as actually preserving freedom, and an orderly society. I also realize that the only way Christianity has any value at all is if it is arrived at as a sincere and voluntary change of heart. To me, "Christian" and "dictatorship" are non sequiturs, and a vast number of Christians are of that same opinion.

    BB

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    1. That's probably because you are not the same kind of Christian as the Dominionist, 'new world order' type that run the GOP. And, no, I don't believe the USA was ever a Christian dictatorship and it's far from it now too - but not as far from it as I would like for it to be. Nothing wrong with decent 'Christian' ethics either - even though they existed before Christianity and are not really Christian.

      The problem comes in when fundamentalism enters and science gets kicked out because young earth creationists want to believe God created the earth about 6,000 years ago and dinosaurs didn't exist. Who put those people in charge of the school boards and local governments? The Christians did! I don't care if these goof-balls want to believe that nonsense but I don't want them teaching it to our kids and turning the USA into a theocrazy like Iran. Read your history, see how it was when the Roman Catholic Church ruled Europe with a rod of iron. Think it can't happen again with the fundies and dominionists? Look around.

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