removing the label...won't stop the conversation

This post is tender offshoot of incomplete thoughts arising from the previous post " Emergent-less Conversations ". With the words of Pete Rollins, we open up the idea of faith as a journey, but, to where...

           

This is not to say that those involved in the emerging conversation choose the idea of journeying over and above the idea of destination; rather, there is a sense in which  such binary thinking  is rejected in favour of the view that faith embraces journey as a type of destination. We can see an example of this seemingly paradoxical  path in the parable of the young traveler who is busy preparing his horse for a long and arduous journey. As he packs his few possessions and old friend approaches him and asks, ' Where are you going?' Without looking up, the traveler quietly replies, ' Away from here.' After a short pause his friend repeats the question, and again the traveler responds by saying, ' I am going away from here.' Finally the friend exclaims, ' I already know that you are leaving us, but what is your destination?' In response the traveler stops what he is doing and looks into the eyes of his companion. ' I have already told you my destination, dear friend. It is away-from-here.

How many in your faith community, could grasp the concept of destination as being " away-from-here." Is he leaving the community ? Leaving town? Is going to be beamed up by the " Star Ship Enterprise? Can we at least have a forwarding address.

In the previous post I mentioned James W Fowler's book, " Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Human Development and the Quest for Meaning " I bring it up again, because it is important and timely, especially in the season we find ourselves, the " emerging/ent church " journeying " away-from-here ", and for the average church trying understand it's season of turmoil. Do we understand " faith as a journey?  It also helps us understand the parable of the young traveler making the journey " away-from-here."

James Fowler's stages of faith are broken down like this...

Faith is seen as a holistic orientation, and is concerned with the individual's relatedness to the universal:

• Stage 0 - "Primal or Undifferentiated"
• Stage 1 – "Intuitive-Projective"
• Stage 2 – "Mythic-Literal" faith
• Stage 3 - "Synthetic-Conventional" faith  characterized by conformity 
• Stage 4 – "Individuative-Reflective" faith a stage of angst and struggle. The individual takes personal responsibility for their beliefs and feelings. 
• Stage 5 – "Conjunctive" faith acknowledges paradox and transcendence relating reality behind the symbols of inherited systems
• Stage 6 – "Universalizing" faith, or what some might call " enlightenment."

Again I ask the question, do faith communities, congregations...and leadership understand faith as a journey? The " average " church has this mix of stages constantly. Looking above you might envision the stages as a ladder, x number of people on a rung. But it's far more fluid, particles in a test tube bumping into one another, interaction, reactions...some good, some not so good. When we all understand the stages of faith, the reactions that arise from interaction are more favorable.

I suspect the majority of traditional churches would be stage 3, some might call it the status quo. They've reached a permanent equilibrium. Alan Jamieson in his book " A Churchless Faith ", would say their beliefs and values are deeply held and usually not critically examined and are therefore tacitly held on to. They know what they know, but are generally unable to tell you how they know something is true except by referring to an external authority outside of themselves. The most common answer might be, " the Bible says so ", or the my " Priest or Pastor said so ." It's uniformed and conformed. This is a group of sheep in a nice safe perimeter fence. I'm not slamming this group. I've been there. I'm just stating it is a reality in the life of a faith community.

I'm thinking Pastors, that like stability, no change, black and white, and PC'S ...would like this group.

Then into the same fence, you in some folks from stage 4-5. Stage 5 as being a place of humility, with none of the brash arrogance of a permanent equilibrium of closure on all theological question. It is a place where people can hold things in tension and appreciate mystery...akin to the realization that the behavior of light needs to be understood simultaneously as wave and particle, even though this is rationally impossible. It's a place of complex simplicity. A place where there is more than one view, multidimensional...where truth can be viewed from two or more angles simultaneously, like wave and particle. This would likely be folks interested, or involved in the " emerging/ent conversation...this is where we would find our young traveler in Pete Rollin's opening parable.

Because we don't understand stages of faith, the interaction between these 2 groups is like mixing oil with water. Try as you might, it just doesn't seem to happen. Mix gently, shake vigorously, they eventually separate back to their like stages. We're right, they're wrong! Usually, the stage 4-5 group, being a minority makes their way towards the back door.

So this is where the emerging/ent church finds itself, on the fringe of the faith community, and on the outer limits of the church at large. The sad thing is  these stages are so polarized.

Dick Staub recently said this;

I awoke this morning with a simple observation that I don’t have time to flesh out, but will simply state and develop later. Here it comes and it is breathtaking (or disappointing) in its simplicity: The problems with American Christianity are spiritual and intellectual not tactical or strategic. The meaning of it should be plain on the surface, but the importance for the next generation is profound.I came to this insight while thinking about the many conferences aimed at next generation church reformers. I observed that they are generally not intergenerational, still lean towards programmatic over relational, but most significantly ~ they tend towards the tactical, methodological and strategic over the intellectual and spiritual.This stands in stark contrast to L’Abri where theologian/philosopher Francis Schaeffer teamed with art historian Hans Rookmaaker to serve next generation seekers.Think of the long shadow cast into today’s younger generation by C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien as inspired by the Inklings, a gathering of friends — British and Christian (though with diverse theological vantage points), most of them teachers at or otherwise affiliated with Oxford University, many of them creative writers and lovers of imaginative literature — who met in C.S. Lewis’s and J.R.R. Tolkien’s college rooms in Oxford during the 1930s and 1940s and later in various Oxford pubs, between the 1940s and 1963 for readings and criticism of their own work, and for general conversation.

I love the image of " L'Abri ", a word which means " The Shelter " in French. is an evangelical christian organization founded by Francis Schaeffer and art historian Hans Rookmaaker in 1955. They opened their alpine home as a ministry to curious travelers and as a forum to discuss philosophical and religious beliefs. No records exist to accurately state the number of people that have visited the home, but it is at least in the thousands.

Schaeffer became an evangelical Christian as a teenager, but he went through a period of spiritual doubt in 1950-1951 and was forced to question his beliefs. By 1955, he was newly confident of his beliefs and had stronger faith, so he and his wife moved to a small house in Huemoz and established L'Abri, without assurance that it would be successful. Initially, few people visited, but as tapes of Schaeffer's lectures spread, the place became more popular.

In the 1970s, L'Abri would commonly have several dozen visitors (and sometimes as many as several hundred) on a given day. Visitors would stay for time periods ranging from a few days to several months. The L'Abri organization itself came to own and operate a number of homes and other buildings in Huemoz. Visitors who were admitted to L'Abri's educational program would have an opportunity to lodge in L'Abri's own buildings, typically with a communal work requirement as described below; other visitors would typically rent rooms or sleeping spaces in pensions offered by townspeople.

We may abandon using the name " emerging/ent ", but the stage 5 where many in the emerging conversation find themselves is not going to go away...it's a timeless reality. In my mind it is this group that is more likely to engage the culture in which we swim. So, I think it exteremely important that we create space for the conversation to be re-kindled, open and inviting...spaces like Wikipedia, Networks, Co-horts, Greenhouses, pubs, libraries, cafe's.

I know there are the naysayers saying the emerging church is not concerned with evangelism, and it's conversations around theology are flawed. There are people with in this group who have a great heart for evangelism, and sound theological thinkers. At a time where the " Church " needs to recover the cosmic redemptive mind of Christ that created all, and is in, and holds all together...we need an imagination that redeems " All."

Comments

[len]

Couple thoughts.. one, we have to disengage in order to engage. I don't know if this is universal, or if it must always be physical, but I think it nearly always must happen in order for people to mature. Two, doing an unrelated study on a theology of religions and reading in Amos Yong. He argues that our Christological center grew out of our organizing around soteriology. I see this as an inevitable outcome for a church enamored with efficiency, definition and quantitative measures. But for a church "Growing out of control," ie learning to surrender outcomes and live by the Spirit, we can also learn anew to affirm process and pilgrimage. I am only realizing now how this goes hand in hand with a post-colonial and post-empirical way of life. Yongs fundamental direction was to reinvigorate Trinitarian theology by exploring a Spirit Christology. But I am beginning to see how all these threads connect..

[ron cole]

Hey Len, I have to laugh many of my pentecostal friends see Amos Yong, as the crazy uncle that should be locked up during the family gatherings, in case he might say something that might upset the family.

In terms of theology and a way forward in post-christendom Amos yong is a visionary thinker, his theology of the Spirit is exciting. I think adds alot to the emerging conversation, but, I doubt many read him.His writing maybe away to engage the culture around us.

[jim]

I shall have to check out this Amos Yong, Ron, for he seems to represent my own theology. Your post set my mind to wondering how I would put my own journey in such terms as you bring forth here; and my only conclusion was that Christ, Himself, is my destination. That may sound silly since I quite often speak of being "in" Christ and Christ being "in" me, but I see Him actually as being seated at the right hand of the Father. Therefore my journey is much as if I were a "puppet" attached to Him by the Holy Ghost, a single "string" re-connecting me to my Father, instituting "Trinity" in me, and my walk not without my own freedom, my own will, but a daily attempt to find His "tug" on my heart. Where am I going? The next step. The next breath. Toward His voice as best I can follow.........

[marion]

I have to say...this post makes more sense to me than the one that inspired it...

I don't think there's any need for us to stumble over any name [all names to describe will be imperfect].

Basically I see it as being teachable, continuing to learn, knowing we have not arrived yet [even though we have received a Gift that starts us on the journey].

I see it as... now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. [1 John 3:2]
we are emerging as, though we are not caterpillars, crawling, we are still not the completely freed from the chrysalis butterflies.