A
dear missionary friend of mine asked me to read Brian Mc Laren's "New
Kind of Christian". Mc Laren brilliantly packages his dissertation as a
narrative where two men dialogue about the demise of all aspects of
modernity (including modern Christianity). Yet, if the first fourth of
a book is like the first five minutes of a movie, I have already
figured out the ending.
Regardless of how he packages it, I
suggest that his "arguments" thus far could be more appropriately
dubbed observations. He seems to fall into the same iconoclastic rut
most postmodern authors do: the kind that leaves a vacuum. Perhaps
giving us guidance on how to proceed might be misconstrued as linear,
modern thinking, yet to be fair I have not finished the book.
I
think that I have read most of what Mc Laren is going to say in other
texts like Barna's certificate of divorce from the modern church,
"Revolution" as well as other texts I have not read like Sweet's "Soul
Tsunami".
As much as I bristle against fundamentalism (a violent
reaction to a world that appears to be spinning out of control) I find
Mc Laren and Rob Bell's view of the world equally unpalatable.
I am beginning to feel like a man without a country.
I
have often described myself as something of an "theological and
ecclesiastical mutt". At bottom, I am a true Baptist insomuch that I
adhere to the truly fundamental precepts of the Baptist views of
congregational polity, immersion baptism, the Lord's Supper, authority
and perspicuity of scripture, salvation by grace through faith. While I
might diverge a bit in soteriology and quite a bit in eschatology I
doubt I would ever challenge the rudiments of faith in the same way I
see the Emergent Movement doing. Perhaps this makes me an unthinking
drone. I tend to think it makes me solid.
What am I getting at?
There
is "asking questions", and then there is "questioning". One stems from
a genuine quest to re-imagine, and the other from a desire for "image".
The EC camp seems to be getting off on the "cool factor" of asking
"hard questions" and at times trying to be savvy simply by making
nonsensical statements akin to the Medieval models of philosophy:
people saying things like "it is impossible, therefore it must be true
(Origen)". They seem to live, not on any cogent concepts of how we are
to advance in this new age, but essentially on "schlock value".
Bell
is creative, but apparently doesn't check his sources very well. For
instance, in his film "Dust" he makes several unverifiable claims about
the training of rabbis in the Second Temple period, such as that they
had to memorize the entire Torah, a claim that I have never encountered
in over a decade of study on the inter-testamental period (although I
am hardly an expert). The trouble is, this makes him look like a fool;
so unfortunately the things he does have to offer are lost in the
mixture of fact and fiction. Although in that particular film, I seriously question his conclusion that Peter's problem was self-doubt.
Mc
Laren recently came under fire, and I think rightfully so, for comments
made at a recent gathering of student ministers where he stated that we
should be less focused on eternity and try to direct students more toward social justice
as a way to work out there faith. I think this is as inaccurate a
position as what we might see from the modern fundamentalist movements.
The
EC is in constant transition. Who knows where it will land, and what
effect it will ultimately have. Yet, we have to understand a few things
about the EC and the Postmodern (PM) worldview before we can even begin
talking about them.
First off, there have always been EC and PM
movements. Take Luther and Calvin for instance. They were both forward
thinking and challenged their contemporary ecclesiologies; both in
practice and theology. Mc Laren makes good points in his chapter about
world views, citing Lewis (another PM thinker) that any Christian who
believed that the Pope was not necessary would have been declared a
heretic four hundred years ago. Yet today, half or more of the world's
Christians have no sense of allegiance to the Pope what-so-ever. In
other words, anyone who looks at a current system and says, "we can do
this better" is by definition "post modern". This is partly because
post modernism is "psycographic" (thought defined) not "demographic"
(age and class defined). For instance, I would argue that my old
philosophy professor, Dan Cochran was vastly more effectively
postmodern than Rob Bell.
So, the question that I have to ask after this gruelingly long, "scrabble word" laden introduction is this:
Is the modern church a sinking ship?
Can
we definitively say that it is time to cast out the last two thousand
years of orthopraxy and even elements we have determined necessary to
orthodoxy to keep the church alive?
I will not give more away on my view, but I hope you will give yours away. d
Comments (3)
"Is the modern church a sinking ship?" Yes and no (I'll forever be the both/and guy). I think that's a subjective issue that needs to be handled on a "case by case" basis.
"Can we definitively say that it is time to cast out the last two thousand years of orthopraxy and even elements we have determined necessary to orthodoxy to keep the church alive?" The problem with the Word of God is that it's the interpreted Word of God. One man's orthodoxy is another man's heresy (you can even expand this to a corporate level; i.e. dispensationalism). While I disgaree with McLaren at points, I can appreciate where he's coming from. The narratives that moderns have embraced and utilized (despite the good that has come about) have resulted in the problems that plague the post-modern generation (even within the church). It's almost a question of pragmatism: what we have received over the last fifty years doesn't work for us. Orthopraxy doesn't look like what we think it should. So, we look for a new narrative, or, at the very least, a more cogent reading of the old one. I personally opt for the latter. I cannot abandon the old,old story, but I also cannot emphasize one point of the story over another, which is what I think both generations are guilty of doing. The SBC has elevated the eternal over the temporal almost to the oint of commiting gnosticism. McLaren, seeking a corrective, is falling off the other side of the horse. If I've said it once, I'll say it again: we need both. Again, these things are not mutually exclusive to one another, and we must hold them in tension.
@Beloved_Shepherd - Would you kindly unpack what you mean by "narrative:.
I tend to think of postmodernism and modernism as kind of two cultural contexts that overlap and will continue to overlap for several generations to come... I don't think "postmodernism" will ever really completely take over the way people think - they will have to come up with a name for what comes next, post-post-modernism, etc. I know lots of people make that observation =0
Anyway, I don't think there is an entity equal to "The Modern Church." There is The Church of Jesus Christ, and we would do well to study postmodernism, the history of modernism and how it has affected our thought life and our political life, but we don't have to let ourselves get caught up in the "narrative" of a war between the two, or the dawning of a new age. We just need to know how to *communicate* effectively to people who are both more and less influenced by the hodgepodge of ideas and thought-patterns known as Postmodernism.
Just as any *good* missionary (these days) studies the culture he or she is bringing the Gospel to and tries to be aware of his or her own ethnocentric biases, we need to be prepared to live and speak with people who are "incredulous toward metanarratives" - but we don't need to try to take the entire church in a direction everyone isn't ready to go. There are still plenty of "modern" people in our towns and cities that need Jesus too. So in that sense, if there is a "Modern Church," then there is still some work for it to do.
I suggest that rather than "casting out" orthodoxy or orthopraxy because what we have supposedly no longer serves our age, we would do better to lay hold more firmly on those elements of our faith which have stood the test of time and been believed and practiced throughout various ages of thought, history, and politics. The "postmodern" church can learn a lot from the "premodern" church. There may even be some things we need to get back. I know that's not a new idea either. I'm a big fan of Thomas Oden by the way - have you read any of his sytematic theology?
Also, a pretty good book on the basics of postmodernism as they relate to Christianity is "Who's Afraid of Postmodernism" by James K.A. Smith.
ALSO, and this just hit me, playing amateur anthropologist for a moment: the very notion of a progression from Pre-Modern, to Modern, to Post-Modern *could* be said to imply an ethnocentric narrative of *Progress* which automatically marginalizes the many people in the world whose worldview is still very much what we would call *Pre*-Modern. There is a huge diversity of worldviews among all the cultures and subcultures of the world. Just because Western Europe is leading the world down a certain path and has been for centuries, doesn't mean everyone necessarily has to keep going in that direction.
But on the other hand, it doesn't mean we should jettison all the good and helpful thinking that's been done to take us through "modernity" and "postmodernity" either...
if I may recommend a few more book possibilities: "God and History" and "Theology and History and Hermeneutics" by Larry Wood. They cover a very interesting sweep of historic-philosophical material, though they really could use a co-author or an editor, but don't tell Dr. Wood I said that, or he might change my ST501 grade before I graduate. But then again, I am recommending the books =)
OK, that's all I've got ;]