I’m reading Proverbs – seek wisdom!<\/p>\n
Within the Church (and greater American Christianity) there is much “wisdom” that is going around these days on how to “save the Church” and increase involvement in Christianity among the increasingly disinterested and disaffected.<\/p>\n
There is a standard and official, “This is what you have to do to survive and grow\u2026\u201d But, we tend to not really look around to see what is working, instead we tend to want to double-down doing what is subjectively familiar (even if not objectively working).<\/p>\n
The parish I’ve served in for the past nine years has nearly doubled its average Sunday attendance within this time frame – and most of the new people are twenty-thirty somethings, singles, young-families.\u00a0 Yet, if you listen to the “wisdom” of the zeitgeist that is going around concerning how our churches need to be situated, by what we do and focus on, we should have no one attending.\u00a0 We seem to be the anti-zeitgeist (but not intentionally – we just don’t get caught up in all that “stuff”).<\/p>\n
We never talk about inclusion or welcome.\u00a0 Yet, we have tea-party people and Communists (literally – except for the religion part).\u00a0 We have Socialist and stanch Capitalists.\u00a0 We have people who think the next Pope should be a woman and people who think women shouldn’t be priests.\u00a0 We have gay people marrying and people who think marriage is only between a man and a woman.<\/p>\n
We never talk about diversity.\u00a0 Yet, we have African-Americans, West Indians, and African-nationals; we have Hispanics and Asians and Middle-Easterners.\u00a0 The majority is now Caucasian, but in the past they weren\u2019t.\u00a0 We have people who struggle mightily with belief in all this stuff and people who have amazing, deep, and simple faith.\u00a0 We have people who have been members for literally 80-years and four new babies this past month.<\/p>\n
Worse yet, our music is traditional (hymns for the 1982 hymnal with anthems and the like) our liturgy is non-fussy Anglo-Catholic with old fiddle-back chasubles (not all) with maniples, three sacred ministers, and “smells & bells.”\u00a0 We are absolutely straight Prayer Book.\u00a0 We use Rite I in our Sunday Mass and don’t change the words.\u00a0 We celebrate “East-facing” with the priest leading the people all facing “East” together.\u00a0 Frankly, we should be driving people out of the church screaming.\u00a0 Yet, we are growing and struggling to keep up with the new people coming in.\u00a0 Right now, we aren\u2019t doing a good job with youth group ministry.\u00a0 We don\u2019t glory in all this, we don\u2019t fight to maintain it, we just do it \u2013 it is just us.<\/p>\n
Our sermons tend to be long for Episcopalians – probably closer to 15-minutes than not.\u00a0 We don’t use all the buzzwords.\u00a0 We rely on Scripture to do the talking.\u00a0 We don’t emote all over the place, we don’t tell people that they should be liberals or conservatives or support the latest, greatest causes – we trust the people do determine for themselves what to be involved in as long as they obey the two great commands of Jesus (which they hear every week in the Rite I liturgy).<\/p>\n
We don\u2019t have an agenda, other than being the Body of Christ in this location \u2013 loving God with all our being and loving our neighbors as ourselves.<\/p>\n
If we listen to the “powers that be” in current American Christianity we should stop doing just about everything we do.\u00a0 Except, that is, if we listen and look around with humble hearts and seeking-to-learn attitudes and with open minds to listen and observe where God is building up His Church – those places that are growing like gang-busters, particularly among younger people – and observe what God is doing.<\/p>\n
You see, those in power don’t need to be a block to what is coming.\u00a0 There doesn’t need to be a “new movement” separate from the established institutions that live into new methods and approaches that resonate with the emerging generation.\u00a0 They don’t need to be the block or hindrance, but too often they are.\u00a0 At some point, we will learn or we will fade away.\u00a0 “How do we not fade away?\u00a0 Into the wild” we should go!<\/p>\n
That, I think, is a good beginning point for employing wisdom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I’m reading Proverbs – seek wisdom! Within the Church (and greater American Christianity) there is much “wisdom” that is going around these days on how to “save the Church” and increase involvement in Christianity among the increasingly disinterested and disaffected. … Continue reading