Ron Cole : off the map...navigating life.

looking for de-institutionalized, de-christianized, unleashed...followers of Jesus

My Good friend Bill Dahl from Bill Dahl.net and creator, editor, author, publisher of the Porpoise Diving Life is looking followers of Jesus who have wandered outside the boundaries of institutional christianity, past the hills of holiness, and the flat lands of religion...to trying to live with Jesus as an ever present reality in the midst of everyday life. Bill is...

Looking for people willing to be interviewed (anonymously or not --  preferably NOT) who possess ALL the following characteristics:

 1. Consider themselves to be "followers of Jesus."
 2. Can affirmatively state "Jesus is my God."
 3. Do NOT currently attend a church - due to their choice - rather than  circumstance (incapacitating  illness etc.)..and are NOT "church shopping" at present.
 4. Do NOT currently work for a church or a faith based organization.
 5. Do NOT currently receive any monetary compensation whatsoever from a church or faith based organization.
 6. Are willing able to articulate the history of their faith journey, current relationship with Jesus,  and this translates into how they live today.
 7. Are NOT currently enrolled in seminary or formal Christian education program in any capacity whatsoever.
 8. Do NOT tithe to a church or faith based organization.
 9. Are NOT - IN ANY WAY - involved in the "religion business."
 10. May consider themselves to have "moved beyond" traditional institutional Christianity.
 11. Are able to articulate what "Live Like Jesus" means to them today.
 12. People who can articulate what "Just Jesus" might mean to them at this stage in their life.

 Please have parties who fit the above criteria and would like to be interviewed - contact Bill Dahl at wsdahl (at) bendbroadband (dot) com with their contact info (email) including telephone number. THANK YOU!

Please pass this to someone you know may fit the above criteria and/or post publicly to invite prospective interview participants. These interviews will be used as the basis of a book I am writing.

Emergent Village Voice...hospitality, diversity in conversations

The new Emergent Village Voice Blog is up and running. There are a lot of are a bunch of folks contributing musings, rekindling and fanning the flames of creative conversation around progressive theology and mission. I share with you a bit of my background and why I think the emerging/ emergent conversation is important.

Much of my past faith life evolved around the church, I don't think there is any church job I haven't done. Ive cleaned church toilets, taught Sunday School, youth worker, treasurer, teaching on spirituality, some preaching and playing drums and percussion on various worship teams. Now I find myself on the fringe of the church. I do attend occasionally, if I had to pick a community that I associate and resonate with it would be more at home on the streets with CARTS; and hopefully back wholloping pots and dishes at the Rainbow Kitchen; hanging out with the youth on local first nations reserve; or playing with the Rev. Up and the DeadBeat Deacons. 

Now 59 years old, about 10 years ago, I found myself wandering from the inside out, towards the fringe of the church. A journey of almost thirty years had left with more questions than answers. It was in that liminal space, that I encountered an open table of profound hospitality, grace...and an emerging conversation that was willing to live in the moment of deep questions. It was like a potluck dinner where everyone contributed something to the meal. No matter how small, insignificant the contribution might have seemed, all was graciously accepted. And the beauty was, it added to the flavor, the color and taste. We could all taste and see, " That God is Good." We were content on tasting everything, to digest everything...it always led to deeper questions. Just as small entrees feed a feast...questions feed a conversation.

Another beauty was, at the table there was wise sages, pilgrims, it was multicultural, there were men and women...and there were some just entering, exploring what faith was all about. And, in the midst of it all, there always seemed to be an open chair...all were welcome.

Fritjof Capra, says this about conversations...

“Conversations are the foundation of our social world. Furthermore, they are the means by which we engage in internal dialog and reflection, founding our internal world and our ability to learn. Conversations connect our personal internal world with another reality.. the others around us, and the Other who surrounds us. Conversation founds not only connection, friendship and community, but also prayer.

“Consider learning. It could be argued that all learning is founded on conversation, even if that dialog is only internal. Single loop learning becomes double loop learning when it becomes conversation and dialog. Language forms the boundaries of our world, and conversation is the means by which we explore and grow in understanding. “Recently organizational theorists have been paying attention toconversation as the fuel of learning communities and the stuff by which organizations learn, adapt and change through shared knowledge. Since change is the order of the day, and since networks are increasingly important to us as we attempt to understand our world toward influencing change, conversation is inextricably linked to leadership.”

“The most powerful organizational learning and collective knowledge sharing grows through informal relationships and personal networks — via working conversations in communities of practice.” ( Fritjof Capra, Creativity and Leadership in Learning Communities )

It is my deepest prayer that this virtual space will be an open table of conversation. That it would be a place where we extend hospitality, and grace. That it would be a place where we explore what it is to have the " mind of Christ." Where we would not be afraid to explore the profound mystery of faith, and humanity with the redemptive imagination of Jesus. That it would be a space in which we sow seeds of encouragement. That rather than sowing seeds of discouragement and condemnation, that in all conversations we might search for that strand of Love, that is Christ...that is in, and of all things, that holds all together...

We look at this Son and see the God who cannot be seen. We look at this Son and see God's original purpose in everything created. For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him. He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment. And when it comes to the church, he organizes and holds it together, like a head does a body.  He was supreme in the beginning and—leading the resurrection parade—he is supreme in the end. From beginning to end he's there, towering far above everything, everyone. So spacious is he, so roomy, that everything of God finds its proper place in him without crowding. Not only that, but all the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe—people and things, animals and atoms—get properly fixed and fit together in vibrant harmonies, all because of his death, his blood that poured down from the cross.( Colossians 1; Eugene Peterson's The Message )

We live in a profound moment of time. Our hope that science might save us is like the frayed end of a rope to which we've come to the end of. Captivated by fear and a sense of hopelessness, we have lost imagination to reach for anything else. We are content to dangle.

Religion in which we've constructed " our " building blocks of wisdom, teeters precariously back and forth. Pieces of its structure fall to the ground. Our bricks of certitude lack the flexibility to stretch to engage the imagination of humanity, in which hope might be seen.

In the gap of science, and religion as humanity we must accept our blindness, and rediscover, and see the profound reality, and truth of faith. It is in this gap we can redeem, re-imagine...Hope.

Although, my faith is framed, and constructed in the profound mysterious story, and life of Jesus. It is from this profound truth, which is the anchor from which I live and explore all life from. But I also, live in the mystery that we are all created in the image of God, and from the voice of Jesus,that, " God is Love." That all life is interconnected, we are all interconnected to a " God " reality. So in this interconnectedness we explore the deep meaning of faith, beyond our religious beliefs, doctrines and dogmas...to the deepest question of humanity. Life.

So We invite dialog and conversations from others faith. Although we may not all agree with each other, may we  honor the sacredness of one another. May we explore deep questions of faith, and humanity together. In all, may we redeem the redemptive imagination of the divine, the God of " all " creation. May we hunger for the imagination, to redeem and restore all the broken spaces of humanity, of redeeming the brokenness of creation. May we again see the creation,in which God looked out on, and said it was " good ".

So let this be a place where we are content with mystery, of questions...may we stretch, and encourage one another.

Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day. ( Letters to a Young Poet...Rainer Maria Rilke )

So if you find yourself struggling with questions...and finding yourself in that strange place where mystery is intriguing making you want to dig deeper, head over to the Emergent Village Voice Blog and join the conversation.

christmas...a revolution birthed in pain

" Silent night, Holy night...all is calm, all is bright ", every christmas we sing this carol. Usually candles in hand, flickering flames dancing on the walls like some angelic visitation. And we reflect on the birth of the God-child. Having two daughters and being present for both of their entrances into this world, I recall vividly it was anything but silent. Despite the pre-natal and birthing classes when the moment came, calmness and a plan were abandoned...for what ever works. Me standing at my wife's side, with her in the utter agony of the moment, dabbing a face cloth on her forehead calmly saying, " pah...pah...pah, slow your breathing down." My wife cranking her head, face contorted yelled, " Will you shut the f#$^ up." 

Revolutions are birthed in pain...always. Even if you want to believe Mary was the picture of smiling calmness, I really believe if you were in the stable and you put your ear close enough to the ground you could hear the birth pains of humanity. It was a world of domination and oppression...politically oppressive, economically exploitative, religiously legitimated...and controlled by armed force. It was world groaning in desperate expectation and hope...for change to be birthed.

It was a world that had begun to write it's own narrative to try and capture the imagination of humanity...a story of the divine son of god, " Caesar " ruler of the empire promising prosperity and security for its citizens. 

Even the Roman currency, Caesar's coin said he was " DIVI F, that is DIVI FILIUS or Son of God. The narrative could be summed up in one of the carved inscriptions from Halicarnassus, modern Bodrum in south west Turkey:

The eternal and immortal nature of everything has bestowed upon mankind the greatest good with extraordinary benefactions by bringing Caesar Augustus in our blessed time the father of his own country, divine Rome, and ancestral Zeus, Savior of the common race of men, whose providence has been not only fulfilled but actually exceeded the prayers for all. For the land and sea are at Peace and the cities flourish with good order, concord and prosperity.

This was the message that was being spun, but, it was not the reality. It was the reality of the 99% verses the 1%. There was no middle class in this culture it was the wealthy and the poor. Rome seized land, agriculture became commercialized. It was peasants working for a days wages if they could find jobs. Peasants lived at a subsistence level in most cases barely surviving. Drought, a bad crop year only intensified the suffering. Government became increasingly corrupt protecting wealth and commodity. Taxes became even more burden on the peasant class. Religion was also infected with corruption. The high Priest and temple authorities became the mediators of imperial rule, responsible for collecting and paying tribute to Rome and for maintaining domestic and moral order. Jerusalem and the temple, the sacred center of the Jewish world, had become the center of native collaboration with empires domination.

You can not read that and not imagine hearing the pain, the anguish and suffering of humanity...pregnant in desperation for hope to come. Out of this profound pain God is birthed into humanity. This God-child is birthed into " our " hands. 

We can't look around the world around us, and wonder if we missed this birth altogether. We were there, watched it all happen but completely missed what it was all about. 

This year, pause, look around...all the way around. Listen, really listen...not tuning in one ear, and tuning out the other.

This time of year there is a lot of money changing hands, out of wallets, across counters and into tills. Consumerism is almost at a feverish frenzy. And much like Caesar's coin, we too have our own with its inscription, " IN GOD WE TRUST." I wonder, unknowingly have we created our own god. The god of our empire. The god who likes what, and whom we like. 

We see poverty on the increase in our towns, and cities around the globe. The poverty in the the so called third world could quite easily approach extinction for many. The environment, we have raped and plundered stealing her resources leaving her naked and exposed while we walk away. The pillars of the economy lay crumbled because of greed, and yet we convince ourselves reinvesting capitalism is the cure. Government has become increasingly corrupt. The vote which once brought change has become a game to amuse the public, while corporate wealth is the new democracy. We have religion implicit, and co-opted with politics, with no prophetic imagination the prevailing narrative of the day is unchallenged. But through it all the empire of the day spins it's message of prosperity and security...peace and goodwill. The american dream is not dead...just in need of some first aid.

But in the midst, if you really listen humanity groans...for something to be birthed beyond anything we can imagine. Revolutions are birthed in the midst of pain. Jesus birth is about the birth of a revolution. It is about a revolution to re-write the narative that would finally recaputure the imagination of humanity. It's about a revolution that would turn the empires of the world upside down in which the Kingdom would be come real. It's where swords became plowshares, we'd love our enemies, forgiveness would be endless, the first would be last, love would conquer all, boundaries and lines would be erased, we'd sacrifice our lives for one another...life would be abundant for all.

This year think about the pain of birth; a world in pain now. Think about revolution being birthed in pain. And most of all...think about the birth of Jesus. Think about the revolution of the Kingdom.

This year...let's pray for the birth of a revolution

it's not speaking theologically...it's the power of words

This past Tuesday I had coffee with a dear friend, a pastor for some thirty years. And in the conversation we were talking about the place Christianity and the church finds itself. It could be almost summed up as a self imposed exile...for the most part, separated and isolated from the context of life. To say the church and the world are light years a part would not be an exaggeration. For myself the biggest thing is the language, and culture problem. If you lived in the church all your life, you likely don't even notice it. Most " christians " live life with in defined borders: tend to hang out with other christians, involved in church activities, listen to christian music and artists; ascribe to a set of beliefs and church doctrine...and all speak theological about their faith. Salvation, redemption, sin, the fall, repentance, salvation, rapture, atonement, saved, wrath, hell...it's all part of the " Christianized " language. Now I'm not condemning any of that, but can you see a problem.

It would be like me picking you up and dropping you into some village in the Amazon jungle. You would start to speak, and all the would here would be blah blah blah...blah. They would speak and you would hear the same. No one is getting each other!

Now...this is where you might want to start grabbing stones; maybe a wooden stake, some fire wood and rope. Anyone who knows me, knows how passionate I am about Jesus, and his Kingdom...I am possessed by it. But the Bible, it's a book...written by inspired men about life in relationship to the profound mystery of a creator God. It's human passion, men consumed with understand a presence beyond their imagination. They put it down in a language in which they understood, in a time in which they lived. But I think today to say God somehow dictated the Bible word for word, or some how loaded it up on a flash drive encrypted so it couldn't be edited in anyway is a bit of a stretch.

Now that's not to say I don't believe who Jesus was, or that I don't believe that there is not divine truth with the biblical narrative. It is filled with the deepest wisdom the world will ever know. And in it, I really believe with in the profound redemptive mystery of " ALL " that Jesus is...is abundant life for humanity now.

Over the years, I have taken criticism for what people call " my theology " on this blog. I've been called a heretic, un-christian and lost...fine, I accept all that. But the culture in which we live will not listen to your christianized blah, blah...blah. What is wrong if I don't use " churchy " language, big theological words. Why can't I use redemptive imagination, metaphors, wild scandalous stories. Why can't I use as Robert Frost says, " the road less travelled." So what if I take a very unorthodox trail but end up in the same place as you.

We live in very troubled, and desperate times. If we can't communicate this profound redemptive story any better than what someone imagined thousands of years ago. We have become unconscious to a God, a creator who woos us and nudges us to re-imagine him constantly. Just like our faith is to be lived, our theological language is to be creative, re-imagined. When we use our imagination we discover there is power in our words. And we might also discover a world willing to listen.

This video kind of says it all...

 

 

Mary...re-imagining Advent

 

( Mary...East Vancouver 2007 )

It’s late Sunday evening and I’m working on the computer and I get a text from my daughter, ” help!” She has to give a reflection at chapel the next day around Advent. My daughter works at christian based Drug and Addiction Rehabilitation Center for young women. So we start the ball bouncing me sending it across the ” net ” and her returning it. Suddenly something profoundly redemptive starts to unravel…it may not be biblically,or theologically correct. 

( Read the rest over at...Emergent Village Voice )

faith...the big picture

 

 

From immersing myself into the depths, into the profound mysterious topography of the gospels I have come to understand that faith is about one thing... this incredible subversive alternative world that Jesus imagined and lived out of constantly. To follow Jesus is not only to believe, but to actually enter into this reality " now "...and to speak, and build it into each moment of our day. These acts are the bricks of the Kingdom upon which we build...it is the reality of " your Kingdom come on earth as in heaven." It is a sign post in which reveals to the world the Kingdom among us, but also points to it's fullness coming.

Jesus came to announce the presence of what he called “the kingdom” or the “reign” of God.  He kept saying “it is like” or “it may be compared to” (see Matthew 13), and he used stories, parables, and metaphors so that we could recognize what was obvious to him but not so obvious to us. Religion can only use the language of metaphor because we are pointing to transcendent things. Jesus told us to pray that this mystery would be as obvious to us “on Earth as it is in Heaven.”

Basically, we can translate “the kingdom” as “the Big Picture.” The kingdom of God, or reign of God, is how things objectively, truly and finally are. Jesus is always inviting us to live in the final and full picture, and not get lost in momentary dramas, hurts or agendas. In Latin we used to say sub specie aeternitate, that is, to ask ourselves every day, “In the light of eternity will this really matter?”

Adapted from Preparing for Christmas with Richard Rohr, p. 11 

 

incoherent and irrelevant...is any one listening

In a my recent post I reflected on the irrelevance of North American Christianity and the church. Andrew Perriman whose theological interest at the moment is in how we retell the biblical story as we negotiate the difficult transition from the centre to the margins of our culture following the collapse of Western Christendom. His most recent post " Will Jesus save us from the wrath to come?"...reveals a deeper twist to the decline and decay of Christendom. Perriman says, " The church at the moment lacks a coherent and relevant voice, so it is hardly surprising that no one is listening."

It is shocking that in this moment in which we " all " find ourselves in the midst of this crisis of loss of human identity and survival...that christianity for the most part is unconscious.

This is Andrew Perriman musing on how the the church needs to work out how to articulate and practice alternative ways of being human...or what I would call bringing the Kingdom to earth as in heaven.

"What they then became was not merely congregations of the saved but prophetic communities of eschatological transformation. By their bold defiance—in the name of Jesus, in the power of the Holy Spirit—of an ineffective Judaism, on the one hand, and a moribund pagan culture, on the other, they constituted a communal sign that the one true creator God was not ineffectual, was not powerless, could not be sidelined, but would act in the foreseeable future to justify himself in the eyes of the nations."

"It was by no means a cheap and easy option. It meant surrendering their bodies—their material selves, not merely their souls—as a “living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship” (Rom. 12:1). This was simply the beginning of the long story of self-denial, suffering and martyrdom that was so central to the experience of the early church."

"We have moved beyond this eschatological event. It is not now the crisis of the death of pagan imperialism with which we are confronted. It is a crisis of the future of humanity. But we are implicated nevertheless. We are not bystanders. And there is much that we can learn by transposing the New Testament story into a creational key."

"For example, we may suppose that the same creator God is calling people today to opt out of the dominant system, visibly and concretely, in order to form contextually appropriate prophetic communities of eschatological transformation, trusting that Jesus will save us from the “wrath” to come."

"If that is the case, then the first task is to hear what the creator God, who raised Jesus from the dead as a guarantee of a new creation, is saying to his world. Paul understood very clearly that if Jesus had been appointed Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead, Caesar’s days were numbered. The church at the moment lacks a coherent and relevant voice, so it is hardly surprising that no one is listening. We long ago ceded the prophetic high ground to secular protest movements."

"Secondly, if the church is to have any integrity and credibility as a prophetic community in the midst of a crisis of human identity and survival, it will need the courage and faith to repent of its complicity in the idolatry of runaway materialism, to repudiate the powers that enslave and destroy in the name of progress. I’m not at all sure that we can do that, and judgment may well have to begin with the household of God."

You can read Perriman's complete post...Here.

the power of irrelevance...

ir·rel·e·vance   (-rl-vns)

n.

1. The quality or state of being unrelated to a matter being considered.

2. Something unrelated to a matter being considered.

 

Ever since I have found myself on the outer fringe of the church I find myself experiencing a weird relationship, almost like " Stockholm Syndrome." It's this crazy feeling that expresses empathy, positive feelings towards a captor, sometimes to the point of defending them. I think until you find yourself on the fringe you may never have this experience. But for much of my life I was in a sense held captive to a church that told me I to accept certain things without questions. It was this bizarre cookie cutter mentality that everything that went in and out of the oven had to be the same...same size, same shape...even smell the same. It's misunderstanding between unity and conformity leans more towards cultism than diverse community. And the more I think about it, the thoughts in my head spinning, tumbling like a clothes dryer stuck in endless cycle. And this feeling in my guts, churning away makes me want to vomit all the bits and pieces...all the broken thoughts onto this screen. It will all sound messy, look ugly, and if you read close enough...even stink. But when you're passionate about something, that is sometimes how it all comes out.

 

Irrelevance is defined as; " the quality or state of being unrelated to a matter being considered." To me, that could also define the state of the church, or for the better part of North American christianity. This not just my take, it comes from having many cups of coffee, and many conversations...interestingly from many people who associated themselves with church, and labeled themselves as christians. My own two daughters have expressed the same concern. Both grew up in the church, and were actively involved. My oldest with degrees in political science and environmental studies, a diploma in journalism and currently working as a journalist in British Columbia. My youngest a graduate with degree from Bible College and working in  a women's Center for Addiction and substance abuse. Both have been carried away by the current growing tide of irrelevance by the church, to the fringe and beyond.

 

For the church to be unrelated to the matter being considered, what are we talking about? In reality, and in the broadest terms...it is unrelated to context of real life. It is more about escapism, than it is about dealing with the reality of life. I think in my conversations with people that is the biggest complaint.

 

 

In a world that seems to be coming a part a the seams in all directions...the environment, the economy, politically, global equality, poverty, unemployment. And the church for the most part seems to hear nothing, see nothing...or speaks nothing. Jesus words, " if you have the eyes to see, and the ears to hear ", somehow out of seeing and hearing Jesus spoke prophetically in the context of a world in disarray. Jesus offered an amazing profound alternative world, which even more incredible could take shape and become a reality now. For the most part the church has become a transit station persuading people to believe in a ticket for an unknown scheduled trip from the world they don't care about...to heaven. Heaven is far more relevant to the church than the world is. And sadly this reality is glaringly obvious to most people outside, or who have left the church.

 

Rarely do I hear or see the church speaking directly into a real time world crisis, offering the profound redemptive imagination of the Kingdom to recreate the alternative world. It may not be the the miracle christians expect, the magic potion of saying the right words and ab bra cad-abra it suddenly appears. I think it is great to have faith in God...but, even more profound...I think God has faith in us. Some how I think the reality of the Kingdom, this profound alternative world, healed made whole, potentially now, in real time...is as much about us, as God.

 

Jesus called us to be heirs in his Kingdom, to be partners, to be co-creators of this subversive alternative world now. Some how a three point sermon, and a closing sound byte to down load into just " you " is nice and personal. You may feel good, but the world around remains unchanged. Somehow I think irrelevance also flows from loss of imagination...even with no brain activity, with great expense we can preserve some kind of life...even if it's a barely breathing church. People outside the church or on the fringe see spirituality differently. It's an organic spirituality that is rooted in the earth, reaching up and out into the midst of all creation. There is a profound sense of inter-connectedness. How I live; how you live; how we live...and how they live...all affects this diverse web of inter-connectedness. In the deepest sense of understanding relationship it is no longer me, you, us or them...we are one.

I love the thought of incarnation...God taking on bones, and flesh...becoming Jesus, the God-man. Jesus moved in our neighborhood, into the midst a broken and messy humanity. He didn't come selling shares in some divine retirement home, a gated community somewhere further and more upscale than cloud nine. Remember when he told people to look around, " it's here, it's among you...the Kingdom, this alternative subversive world is in your midst." He came to give us abundant life now. He wanted us to see it's potential, in and among us. And once we found it, we would treasure it...it would consume us. Nothing could stop us from building its reality among us, here and now; " Father may your Kingdom come, on earth as in Heaven." For the God-man to pray for heaven to come to earth reveals his spirituality. Jesus lived an in this world kind of faith. His profoundly mysterious redemptive imagination revealed in his parables, his actions, confronting wealth, oppression, injustice, religion, politics...were all about building this alternative world now that would eventually merge into the world that is to come. His faith was about life in real time...Now!

The church that does not consume itself with this down to earth spirituality of Jesus; that is not consumed with building this alternative world...will remain labeled and defined by " Hello...my name is Irrelevant." 

 

kinnon.tv ...seeing faith through the lens

If your not following Bill Kinnon...you should be. James MacDonald calls him a celebrity blogger, and Brian McLaren says he's a Master Blogger ...I call him provocative, challenging and honest. Bill keeps the pendulum in any conversation from swinging to wildly out of control. Rick Meigs calls Bill an " instigator. " Yes, Bill can stir things up, but, he does it in a good way. Bill brings a perspective to to faith conversation that many of us miss, and when Bill's not around it seems a little empty. But besides blogging, Bill is an incredible film maker. bring 30 years of experience. Many of Bill's film involves faith communities, the missional church, Fresh Expressions...locally and globally. I can only assume that with Bill's travels, his diverse conversations...what he sees and hears. Bill Kinnon understands the shifting landscape of how faith is being lived out here and abroad.

Below are two fabulous videos of faith communities in Toronto...Sanctuary and Parkdale Neighborhood Church. Anyone familiar with Greg Paul's book, " God in the Alley " will have an idea of what Sanctuary is about. I know you can't re-create church by plugging in someone else's into your own...it never works. It needs to be formed in your own locality, your context, your neighborhood...it needs to be organic. But when you look at these two communities, you sense that's how it happened. A simple seed, humbly planted, nurtured over time. It wasn't just hammered into the ground anywhere, and fertilized to force some kind of unrealistic growth. It's this incredible humble, hospitable, grace-filled environment that works like  redemptive incubator in which a new kind of life...a new kind of community unfolds naturally. These communities inspire me...sadly I wish there were far more like these. Anyway...please watch. Thanks as always Bill for sharing what you see and hear.

 

Sanctuary from Medri Kinnon Productions on Vimeo.

 

 

Parkdale Neighbourhood Church (PNC) from Medri Kinnon Productions on Vimeo.

 

Occupy...and Sanctuary

It seems the last of the Occupy Movement in various cities globally and nationally are being dismantled. Will it have been any more than a " news story " initially capturing the front page and then shuffled, slowly sinking in the depths of the lost and unread. Like the last physical remnants of the movement being swept up by city workers and chucked in to a dumpster. Will we as a humanity do the same, sweeping it into a dark damp corner in the recessess of our mind, letting it slowly decompose. The " church " in a bizzare ironic flip much like Pontious Pilate basically just washed it's hands of the whole affair as to not implicate or associate itself with the movement. There are some you will say I'm just being too critical. I would say look around your neighborhoods, countries and the globe...there was no overall loud and clear prophetic voice representing the radical scandalous redemptive imagination of Jesus. If anything, it was a whisper or whimper of a " body " on life support.

Through it all, I have been consumed with the idea of, " Sanctuary." 

 

( outside the front steps of the Cathedral of St. James in Toronto )

What is your idea of " Sanctuary "? For much of North American Christianity it's a bunker in which we hunker down in safety, where the band plays songs much like on the deck of the Titanic as the world sinks deeper and deeper into hopelessness. It's the bus terminal where we wait with our reservations, tickets in hand for that flight bound for heaven. For too much of North American Christianity " Sanctuary " comes down to a couple of hours on a sunday morning. But this was not always how " Sanctuary " has been perceived and lived out. 

As far back to the fourth century, sacred spaces such as church sanctuaries were recognized by law as places of refuge where fugitives were immune from arrest. They also became places of political sanctuary. The United Nations expanded the definition of "political" to include race, religion, political opinion, and membership and/or participation in any social group or social activity. Sanctuary became places for asylum, places of refuge...safety, shelter, rest, and peace.

There are stories of battles when a country got the upper hand winning the fight, and some of the adherents of the loosing side might find themselves surrounded by the winning side unable to return to their own side would rush to sanctuary in the nearest church until it was safe to leave. It was the idea that there was an anchor of justice beyond the morality of men that you could tie yourself into for safety. There are stories that if a person just clung to the altar in the sanctuary mortal men could not touch you. Sure there were cases of people also being killed in sanctuaries, but the reality was in the imagination of humanity there was sense of a kind of divine justice beyond that of the world.

Back then, " sanctuary " was as much about humanity as it was about a space of worship for " God " only. This was truly the crossroad where it all came together in the context of real life. Sanctuary was shelter...for displaced people, refugees and the homeless. Sanctuary was humanitarian...a source of help, relief or comfort in times of trouble. Oppressed groups of people could seek refuge in sanctuary. Debt relief might even be found in sanctuary. Sanctuary could also be a place where people were cared for...the sick, people with physical disabilities, mental illness.

But if " Sanctuary " was also the place where " justice " was acted out...it was also the place where " Justice " was proclaimed and spoken. 

"In the profound scandalous redemptive imagination of Jesus...the " Church " has lost touch with what " Sanctuary " really is."

We have to go back to Jesus of Nazareth, and dive deep into the depths of the gospels...into the life and words of Jesus and really grasp what sanctuary is. 

Most fundamentally he challenges us to give priority to mercy; without it, nothing else has any meaning. His honesty toward reality, his will to truth, his judgment on the situation of the oppressed majorities and the oppressive minorities, his call to be the voice of the voiceless against those who have too much voice. His reaction to that reality: defending the weak, denouncing and unmasking the oppressor.

His faithfulness in upholding honor and justice to the very end, in the face of internal crises and external persecutions. His freedom to bless and curse, to go to the synagogue on the Sabbath but also to place human beings ahead of the Sabbath; in short, his freedom to let nothing stop him from doing good.

His vision of an end to the misfortunes of the poor and happiness (therefore, blessedness) for his followers. His embrace of sinners and the marginalized, his sitting at the table and celebrating with them, his joy over God's self-revelation to them. His signs--only modest signs of the kingdom--and his utopian horizon that took in the whole society, the world and history. And finally, his trust in a good God, close by, whom he called Father, while at the same time he remained attentive to the Father who is God, the unmanageable mystery.

In this millennium, in this moment of time the church needs to re-imagine " Sanctuary "...in my deepest, wildest most profound imagination, " Sanctuary " is Jesus. And the church who is to be his " body " needs to be the sanctuary to the world that surrounds it.

" Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly." ( Eugene Peterson's; The Message; Matthew 11:28 )

This is not an invitation for just the " in-crowd ", your religion, my religion...all the right boxes checked off in what you believe. This was an invitation for the broken, the oppressed, the poor, the marginalized, the victimized, the sick, the lame, the blind, the sinner...for the brokenness of all humanity to seek sanctuary in the mysterious redemptive reality of all the Jesus is.

It's my prayer, that the " Occupy Movement " has ignited, and re-kindled the imagination in the heart, mind and soul of the church to what " sanctuary " is. That in the divine redemptive imagination in the mind of Christ we will be that sanctuary. That we will open our doors, and our mouths...in action, and proclaim the redemptive justice of Jesus.