Discussions on "Heresy, Universalism, Hell and Free Will"

http://www.patheos.com/community/rogereolson/2011/07/30/how-serious-a-heresy-is-universalism/

by Roger Olson

on July 30, 2011

Comments

I have called universalism “the most attractive heresy.” For a lover of God’s love, universal salvation might seem to be necessary. (I guarantee you that some neo-fundamentalist will take that sentence out of context and attribute it to me without acknowledging what follows.) However, I’m not a universalist. On the other hand, I’d rather be a universalist than a true Calvinist (i.e., a five point Calvinist who believes in double predestination).

Someone once asked me whether I would still worship God if somehow I became convinced the Calvinist view of God is correct. I had to say no. Sheer power is not worthy of worship. Only power controlled by love is worthy of worship.

If somehow I became convinced that universalism is correct, would I still worship God. Yes, but…. I would have to wonder how a God of love can enjoy love from creatures that is not given freely. Of course, someone might argue that, in the end, every creature will freely offer love to God and be saved (e.g., Moltmann). I would just call that optimism. There’s no way to believe that's true other than a leap of optimistic hope.

Everyone harbors some heresy in his or her heart and mind. The only question is–how serious are the heresies one holds? Of course, nobody thinks they harbor any heresies (in the sense of theologically incorrect beliefs).

I agree with Swiss theologian Emil Brunner (and others) that universalism is heresy. It is unbiblical and illogical. However, that does not mean a person who holds it is not a Christian. I have never met a Christian who was one hundred percent theologically correct. Scratch hard enough and you’ll always find some heresy beneath the surface (if not on the surface). That’s true for me as much as for anyone else. If I thought I held no heresies, I’d think I had already arrived at the fullness of truth–something even the apostle Paul did not claim.

I think universalism is a minor heresy SO LONG AS it does not interfere with evangelism. (See my earlier post here about why universalism should NOT interfere with evangelism.) I also evaluate the seriousness of universalism by its context–viz., why does the person affirm it? If universalism is evidence of a denial of God’s wrath and/or human sinfulness, then it is much more serious. Barth’s universalism (yes, I believe Karl Barth was a universalist and I’ll post a message here about why later) did not arise out of those denials which is why he didn’t like the appellation “universalist.” The term is usually associated with liberal theology. In that case, as part of an overall liberal/modernist theology, I consider it very serious indeed.

Strictly historically speaking, any universalism is heresy–according to all major branches of Christianity. The Catholic church allows hope for universal salvation but not confident affirmation of it. But, of course, as Luther demonstrated, all branches of Christianity can be wrong. That is why I reject paleo-orthodoxy and any appeal to absolute authority of tradition. Tradition gets a vote but never a veto. The Bible trumps tradition.

When universalism is believed on biblical grounds (as in The Evangelical Universalist by Gregory McDonald–a pseudonym), it is much less serious than when it is believed as part of a liberal theology that denies the wrath of God and the sinfulness of all human beings (except Jesus Christ, of course).

(Sidebar regarding neo-fundamentalism: A neo-fundamentalism is someone who will take what I have written here and claim I have affirmed universalism or at least given aid and comfort to heretics. A neo-fundamentalist, like a straightforward fundamentalist, is a person who cannot distinguish between non-absolute condemnation of error and error itself. Count on it. Some probable Southern Baptist heresy-hunting neo-fundamentalist will pick up on this blog post and spread it around as “proof” that Roger Olson harbors sympathies with universalism. That is, however, evidence of either a weak mind or ill will.)

So, what is my final word on universalism? I don’t have a “final word” on it because “it” is not all that clear. What kind of universalism? Based on what? I consider all positive affirmations of universal salvation that include denial of everlasting hell heretical. But not all are equally bad or condemnable. Some are based on confusion. Some are based on liberal theology. Some (e.g., Karl Barth’s) are based on the logic of God’s love and electing grace (viz., “Jesus is victor!”). All are wrong, but not all are equally bad.

Let me be clear  (this is necessary because of the power of neo-fundamentalists within evangelicalism today!) I am not a universalist nor do I sympathize with universalism. I am simply trying to get people to consider the possibility that not all versions of universalism are on the same level of error. There is (1) egregious error and there is (2) simple error. One kind of universalism (based on denial of God’s wrath and human sinfulness) is egregious error. Another kind (based on confusion about God’s love requiring his overriding free will) is simple error. I hope I don’t hold any egregious errors, but I’m sure I hold some simple errors. I am open to having those pointed out to me.

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Hopefully Now I Am Able to Respond re: Hell and all That

http://www.patheos.com/community/rogereolson/2011/07/29/hopefully-now-able-to-respond-re-hell-and-all-that/

by Roger Olson

on July 29, 2011

Comments (56)

This morning I wasn’t able to respond to all of the comments. Hopefully now I can.

Someone suggested that a person who refuses God’s love, preferring hell, would not be free but insane. In that case, he suggested, a God of love would save the person without his or her consent.

My response is that even an insane person has free will. As a society we do not force insane people into institutions to be “cured.” (See C. S. Lewis’ defense of that in an essay in God in the Dock. He was very sensitive to the whole issue of governments deciding who is and who is not insane and to forceful treatment of those deemed insane.) If a person who refuses God’s love is insane, it’s an odd kind of insanity that we may simply be attributing to him or her because we don’t understand their choices. I don’t think God is obligated by his love to force his grace on anyone against their will.

Also, we need to keep in mind the difference between free will and true freedom. I’ve discussed that important distinction here before. The only person who is truly free is one who is all that God intends for him or her to be. But free will is the gift God gives us with which to move toward or away from that real freedom. Real freedom is ours to lose; misusing free will is how we lose it. God graciously extends to all the possibility of realizing true freedom IF we meet a certain condition–acknowledge our dependence on him and his grace and cease our own efforts to achieve it apart from God. The only alternative would be for God to force true freedom on us which seems oxymoronic.

The only way I see to avoid universalism (which I cannot accept because of my belief in free will and God’s respect of our personhood and desire for our free, uncoerced acceptance of his grace) and Calvinism’s view of hell as God’s horrible decree (which makes God a monster) is to view hell as our choice–not God’s. Hell is real, but only because we insist on making it real. 

As C. S. Lewis said, in the end there are only two kinds of people–those who say to God “Not my will but thine be done” and those to whom God says “Not my will but thine be done.”

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Some random thoughts about that awful but necessary word “heresy”

http://www.patheos.com/community/rogereolson/2011/08/02/some-random-thoughts-about-that-awful-but-necessary-word-heresy/

by Roger Olson

on August 2, 2011

Comments (28)

Recently I’ve used the word “heresy” here. I hate that word, but I find it inescapable. But dictionaries aren’t very helpful for defining it (or many other necessary theological terms). So, in an attempt to shed some light (and hopefully less heat) on the matter, please bear with me as I explain what I mean by it.

The most general meaning of heresy is any theological error as determined by some authoritative religious group. In other words, to call something heresy is to imply that it is not just theologically mistaken in one’s judgment but also in the judgment of some organized (or at least semi-organized) group of religious people (e.g. a denomination or movement). When I call a belief (or denial of a belief) “heresy” I do NOT mean it is something I find erroneous by my own lights. There are many things I find erroneous by my own lights; they are not all heresies. When I call something heresy I mean it is generally considered seriously theologically mistaken by some group I recognize as having some authority to make such judgments.

But even there a caveat is in order.

When I call something a heresy I MIGHT mean it is considered theologically mistaken by a group I recognize as having some right and authority to make such judgments BUT I DISAGREE in which case I would be using the term in a strictly descriptive, not prescriptive, manner. OR, when I call something a heresy I MIGHT mean it is considered theologically mistaken by a group I recognize as having some right and authority to make such judgements AND I AGREE in which case I would be using the term prescriptively and not only descriptively.

Also, I think every group implicitly recognizes degrees of seriousness of heresies. For example, the Catholic church considers obstinate heresy tantamount to apostasy but does not consider all theological error tantamount to apostasy. In other words, once a person has been shown the serious error of his or her thinking and persists in it, that amounts to apostasy. On the other hand, when it is determined that a person simply does not understand that his or her thinking is erroneous and why, the error is not automatically tantamount to apostasy.

Think about my three categories of right religious beliefs: dogma, doctrine and opinion. (I have written about this rubric in many places.):

1 - A dogma is a a belief considered essential to authentic Christianity (insofar as a person is capable of understanding such matters).

2 - A doctrine (in this technical sense) is a belief not essential to authentic Christianity but essential to being faithful to a particular church system and its tradition.

3 - An opinion is a belief one holds that is not essential to anything.

A similar taxonomy could be used for heresy:

1 - egregious heresy amounting to apostasy (when the person is capable of understanding such matters),

2 - heresy as denial of something important to a church system and its tradition,

3 - and heresy as profoundly mistaken belief but not a denial of anything essential to either authentic Christianity or a particular church system and its tradition.

One thing should now be apparent: “heresy” is itself an essentially contested concept AS SOON AS one applies it to a particular belief (or denial). In other words, what counts as heresy (of any kind) in one form of Christian life may not count as that in another one.

As an evangelical Protestant Christian I work within and out of that general tradition and I define it broadly–as encompassing a wide range of denominational traditions and doctrinal systems. For example, it includes both Reformed and Anabaptist individuals and groups (to choose two branches about as far apart as any two can be and still somehow be part of the same movement!). When, over a long period of time, the consensus of all evangelicals is that something is heresy, I tend to call that heresy also. But I don’t think all heresies are equally pernicious.

For example, all evangelical Christians (and I’m talking about respected spokespersons for the movement beginning with Edwards and Wesley and ending for now with Henry and Graham) agree that denial of the deity of Jesus Christ is heresy. They also agree that FOR SOMEONE WHO CLAIMS TO BE EVANGELICAL to deny the importance of conversion is heresy. But the second heresy is specific to evangelicalism; the first one is universal among all orthodox Christians. I would have trouble recognizing someone as “evangelical” who denied the importance of conversion, but I wouldn’t necessarily say he or she is not a Christian.

Another tradition I belong to is Baptist. A person who denies the deity of Jesus Christ is, in my view, not a Christian whether he or she is a Baptist or not. A person who denies the importance of believer baptism may be a Christian but is certainly not a Baptist!

So, when I say that a person who denies the importance of believer baptism is a heretic I’m using the term in relation to being Baptist and not in relation to being Christian. Such a person would, of course, have to be Baptist for that appellation to apply. That person would possibly not be a heretic in another church system and tradition.

When I say that we are all heretics, I mean we all hold some mistaken beliefs–the third category that corresponds with opinion. We all hold opinions that are theologically incorrect even if we will only find that out with certainty in the afterlife.

So, now, that all points to the question–what do I mean when I say universalism is heresy? Well, it certainly is historically a heresy within the evangelical movement and its tradition. Whether it is a heresy in terms of authentic Christianity, making a universalist automatically apostate, is another question. For now, anyway, I don’t think so. There have been good Christian universalists and, from where I sit, there is no authoritative Christian magisterium to settle that question. I tend to look back to the consensus of the church fathers and reformers, but I also recognize they could have been wrong about some things.

So, when it comes to making my own personal judgments about heresy in the absence of an authoritative body that I regard as legitimate for deciding with finality what counts as heresy I have to turn to my own best theological judgment. Then I should say “In my opinion, going by my own best theological judgment, such-and-such is heresy.” And the I should explain what level of seriousness I attribute to that heresy.

All this messiness is why some Protestants run to the Catholic church. It has a magisterium to settle these matters. But is that magisterium always automatically right? I don’t think so. Therefore, I have to live with the messiness of terms like heresy that can’t be completely avoided but contain a good deal of ambiguity.

Practically speaking, on the ground, so to speak, when I say something is heresy, at the very least I mean I would not affiliate with a church or denomination that tolerated it among its leaders OR that I would at least continue to try to convince those who held the defective belief that they are wrong.

If someone has a better approach to defining “heresy” that does NOT appeal to an authoritative magisterium or simplistically say “unbiblical” I would love to hear it. In the meantime, at least you now know what I mean when I utter “heresy” toward a belief (or denial of a belief).

continue to -

 

Index to past articles on "Calvinism v. Arminianism"

 

 




 

Spirituality Requires Good Doctrine

Rethinking Spirituality Through Doctrine and Doctrine Through Spirituality

http://homebrewedchristianity.com/2011/08/07/rethinking-spirituality-through-doctrine-and-doctrine-through-spirituality/

by Deacon Hall

August 7, 2011

 

As the old saying goes, “when it rains, it pours.” And somehow, the world has been pouring spirituality down on me as of late! I have to admit, I’ve rather enjoyed it. Currently, I’m reading a book by a Benedictine Sister named Joann Chittister called The Rule of Benedict, and it reinterprets the Benedictine Rule for contemporary living. Furthermore, my church will be offering itself up to Stillpoint, a wonderful organization that offer spiritual formation courses for those who want to enter more deeply and lovingly into a relationship with the divine. I will even meet with, and learn from, a spiritual advisor in the coming weeks (a position that I must honestly confess I didn’t know existed until I joined the Episcopal Church).

Despite this pouring out of spirituality in my life, I’ve noticed a theme emerge in these spiritual formation courses and opportunities that need not be there. Often times, spiritual organizations “market” (for honest lack of a better term) themselves in such a way that they will help you to get “deeper” into the divine than any silly dogmatic, doctrinal, or intellectual statement could ever bring you; they’ll help you to enter into God more personally. While the latter clause certainly presents a good goal, I simply wonder whether the former method—getting beyond doctrinal statements and properly reflective thinking—is necessary to it.

The unfortunate view that we moderns and “post-moderns” have adopted with regard to intellectuality is that we tend to think of it as somehow “neutral,” “unaffected by the world around it,” “objective,” and after truths for which we have no feeling. (“Postmoderns,” if this word means anything in particular, would generally deny that we are neutral but tend to uphold neutrality as something like an ideal for perfected reason). So we conceive of the height of intellect in terms of calculative procedures: hypothesizing, experimenting, verifying, and tabulating. We’ve defined thinking, in other words, by the empirical method that emerges from the Enlightenment and its focus on the natural sciences. I actually don’t think this is such a bad view of intellect in certain situations, but I do think it constitutes a reduction of the intellect and its ideality such that, with this notion in mind, it is no wonder that talk of getting beyond intellect for getting deeper into the divine emerges in this context.

Yet, intellectualism has not always been thought of in this way. Take Plato. For Plato, the intellect is something like another desire. That is, in the same way that a hungry stomach desires food, the intellect desires truth. Indeed, for Plato, the intellect is given over to an erotic drive to reach the Truth, the entirety of which I need not get into. The point being thus: the intellect is far from a neutral observer of things that merely conveys ideas through words to a detached mind. The intellect is passionate, directed, and “in love.” The intellect is our movement through the real to God in God’s self, at least for Plato.

We can see this Platonic principle at work, too, in a myriad of Christian mystics and thinkers, namely, the idea that the intellect does not merely hinder our relationship with the divine, but is a properly spiritual avenue for expressing that relationship. Such an understanding has been generally called “faith seeking understanding.” One need not go any further than Anselm, the founder of this saying, to understand the true context of this saying. His Monologion especially is an intellectual appropriation of a prior faith given to him by the spirit and expressed in words. It is a prayer, or an intellectual reflection on his prayers, that grasps at doctrines such as the nature of God’s Trinitarian being and Goodness, among other things.

This isn’t to say that Anselm believes himself to understood or thought through his faith fully, which is why there is a sense in which “going beyond intellect” holds some sway in spirituality. Rather than “getting beyond” intellect, I think the better way to think through the issue is in the following ways. On the one hand, one cannot properly think through the being of God without being centered in God’s being pre-cognitively; on the other hand, if one is brought into the being of God pre-cognitively, then thinking is a perfect expression of one’s spirituality and one of the major means through which we come to, worship, and exist in relationship to God.

In other words, thinking through doctrine such as the nature of the being of the God-man, the Trinity, the idea of salvation, etc., is anything but a hindrance to entering into a deeper spiritual relationship with God. I would at least claim that, as a Christian, thoughtful reflection on precisely these doctrines allow us to draw ever nearer to the divine and the divine’s love for us, found for us on all sides of the cross. The key, then, is to simply not accept the statements dogmatically—as calculative beliefs that, should we ascent to them, allow us entrance into heaven or, should we reject them, send us straight to hell. Nor should we accept such doctrines as somehow objectively and empirically verifiable, able to be found without God bringing us specifically into God’s own being such that these become meaningful doctrines in the first place. Rather, these latter two types of thinking are the ones that today’s spirituality promises to get us beyond—and rightly so!

But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Doctrinal statement is already a part of spirituality, for one can only write it and utter it with any form of seriousness by already being within the spirit.

All this said, I’m working through these spiritual disciplines and books, and I will definitely continue to do so. I’ve benefitted greatly from them. However, I would also like the chance to more deeply engage in a spirituality of the Cross, a spirituality of the Resurrection, a spirituality of Trinitarian relations or of the Spirit intimately involved with all these movements and events, even known only as such in and through them. Obviously, such spiritualities are out there, and it would probably, at most, take some light googling to find spiritual exercises focused in such doctrines. But it is worth noting that, however such spiritualities and spiritual formation courses would be put together with such an emphasis, they would need to retain a deep intellectual content to them—a content that neither takes one away from doctrinal formulation nor from spiritual depth but pushes one deeper into both.

Such spiritualities would require that we change our manner of thinking about what thinking is and is supposed to do. Rather, we would need to take seriously the statement found in the picture at the beginning of this post—a saying of Heidegger’s posted at the beginning of a trail in the Black Forest dedicated to him. The sign says something like, “in thinking is each thing long and slow.” That’s probably good spiritual advice.

John Stott - The Best of Evangelicalism

Op-Ed Columnist

Evangelicals Without Blowhards

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/31/opinion/sunday/kristof-evangelicals-without-blowhards.html

Nicholas D. Kristof

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Published: July 30, 2011

IN these polarized times, few words conjure as much distaste in liberal circles as “evangelical Christian.”

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Nicholas Kristof addresses reader feedback and posts short takes from his travels.

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Richard Perry/The New York Times

That’s partly because evangelicals came to be associated over the last 25 years with blowhard scolds. When the Rev. Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson discussed on television whether the 9/11 attacks were God’s punishment on feminists, gays and secularists, God should have sued them for defamation.

Earlier, Mr. Falwell opined that AIDS was “God’s judgment on promiscuity.” That kind of religious smugness allowed the AIDS virus to spread and constituted a greater immorality than anything that occurred in gay bathhouses.

Partly because of such self-righteousness, the entire evangelical movement often has been pilloried among progressives as reactionary, myopic, anti-intellectual and, if anything, immoral.

Yet that casual dismissal is profoundly unfair of the movement as a whole. It reflects a kind of reverse intolerance, sometimes a reverse bigotry, directed at tens of millions of people who have actually become increasingly engaged in issues of global poverty and justice.

This compassionate strain of evangelicalism was powerfully shaped by the Rev. John Stott, a gentle British scholar who had far more impact on Christianity than media stars like Mr. Robertson or Mr. Falwell. Mr. Stott, who died a few days ago at the age of 90, was named one of the globe’s 100 most influential people by Time, and in stature he was sometimes described as the equivalent of the pope among the world’s evangelicals.

Mr. Stott didn’t preach fire and brimstone on a Christian television network. He was a humble scholar whose 50-odd books counseled Christians to emulate the life of Jesus — especially his concern for the poor and oppressed — and confront social ills like racial oppression and environmental pollution.

“Good Samaritans will always be needed to succor those who are assaulted and robbed; yet it would be even better to rid the Jerusalem-Jericho road of brigands,” Mr. Stott wrote in his book “The Cross of Christ.” “Just so Christian philanthropy in terms of relief and aid is necessary, but long-term development is better, and we cannot evade our political responsibility to share in changing the structures that inhibit development. Christians cannot regard with equanimity the injustices that spoil God’s world and demean his creatures.”

Mr. Stott then gave examples of the injustices that Christians should confront: “the traumas of poverty and unemployment,” “the oppression of women,” and in education “the denial of equal opportunity for all.”

For many evangelicals who winced whenever a televangelist made the headlines, Mr. Stott was an intellectual guru and an inspiration. Richard Cizik, president of the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good, who has worked heroically to combat everything from genocide to climate change, told me: “Against the quackery and anti-intellectualism of our movement, Stott made it possible to say you are ‘evangelical’ and not be apologetic.”

The Rev. Jim Wallis, head of a Christian organization called Sojourners that focuses on social justice, added: “John Stott was the very first important evangelical leader to support our work at Sojourners.”

Mr. Stott, who was a brilliant student at Cambridge, also underscored that faith and intellect needn’t be at odds.

Centuries ago, serious religious study was extraordinarily demanding and rigorous; in contrast, anyone could declare himself a scientist and go in the business of, say, alchemy. These days, it’s the reverse. A Ph.D. in chemistry is a rigorous degree, while a preacher can explain the Bible on television without mastering Hebrew or Greek — or even showing interest in the nuances of the original texts.

Those self-appointed evangelical leaders come across as hypocrites, monetizing Jesus rather than emulating him. Some seem homophobic, and many who claim to be “pro-life” seem little concerned with human life post-uterus. Those are the preachers who won headlines and disdain.

But in reporting on poverty, disease and oppression, I’ve seen so many others. Evangelicals are disproportionately likely to donate 10 percent of their incomes to charities, mostly church-related. More important, go to the front lines, at home or abroad, in the battles against hunger, malaria, prison rape, obstetric fistula, human trafficking or genocide, and some of the bravest people you meet are evangelical Christians (or conservative Catholics, similar in many ways) who truly live their faith.

I’m not particularly religious myself, but I stand in awe of those I’ve seen risking their lives in this way — and it sickens me to see that faith mocked at New York cocktail parties.

Why does all this matter?

Because religious people and secular people alike do fantastic work on humanitarian issues — but they often don’t work together because of mutual suspicions. If we could bridge this “God gulf,” we would make far more progress on the world’s ills.

And that would be, well, a godsend.

I invite you to comment on this column on my blog, On the Ground. Please also join me on Facebook, watch my YouTube videos and follow me on Twitter.

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Rev. John Stott, Major Evangelical Figure, Dies at 90 

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/28/world/europe/28stott.html?pagewanted=all

 

By WOLFGANG SAXON
Published: July 27, 2011

 

The Rev. John Stott, one of the world’s most influential figures in the spread of evangelical Christianity over the past half-century, died Wednesday in Lingfield, Surrey, in the south of England. He was 90.

The Rev. John Stott at Trinity Church in Manhattan in 2006. Mr. Stott exerted influence largely through his many books.

His death was confirmed by Suanne Camfield, a spokeswoman for his publisher, InterVarsity Press.

The religion scholar Michael Cromartie once said that if evangelicals could elect a pope, they would be likely to choose Mr. Stott. Though less known in the United States and hardly a household name outside the evangelical sphere, Mr. Stott, an author, preacher and theologian, was often compared to the Rev. Billy Graham, his American contemporary.

But while Mr. Graham’s influence is rooted in a rousing preaching style and a personal magnetism that has filled stadiums, Mr. Stott’s relied on a proliferation of books — grounded in learning but accessible to all — and the evangelical organization he founded, Langham Partnership International, named after its cradle, All Souls Church at Langham Place in London’s West End.

“We must be global Christians,” he once wrote, “with a global mission, because our God is a global God.”

Beginning at the college campus level and branching out country by country, the Langham Partnership (known as the John Stott Ministries in the United States) grew into an organization comprising 5 national and 10 regional nondenominational movements.

Before then, through the Anglican Church, Mr. Stott had led a revival of evangelical Christianity in Britain, exhorting Britons to find personal salvation by repenting sin and accepting Jesus as their savior.

But he also demanded that evangelicals look beyond liturgy and Christian tradition and remain engaged in worldly matters — “to take more responsible attitudes toward economics, the arts, politics and culture in general,” as Mark A. Noll, a University of Notre Dame professor and scholar of the movement, said in an interview in 2007.

“And perhaps most importantly,” Professor Noll added, Mr. Stott became “a patron, mentor, friend and encourager of thousands of pastors, students and laypeople from the newer Christian parts of the world.” He became a bridge, Professor Noll said, “between the West and the rising Christian world.”

Mr. Stott was dedicated to helping the poor in developing countries, what he termed the Majority World. Using royalties from his books, he set up trusts to help gifted students from the developing world earn doctorates abroad and then return to their native countries to teach in theological seminaries.

For all his fame on several continents, Mr. Stott’s travels and appearances were remarkably devoid of pomp, befitting his simple message of reason and faith and his unassuming demeanor. Those in his ministries knew him simply as Uncle John. In his later years, he lived in a two-room apartment over the garage of a London rectory, and for many years he kept a small cottage on the Welsh coast, where he did much of his prodigious writing in longhand and, until 2001, without electricity.

“Pride is without doubt the greatest temptation of Christian leaders,” Mr. Stott said in 2006 during a visit to the United States. “And I’m very well aware of the dangers of being feted and don’t enjoy it and don’t think one should enjoy it.”

Believing the college campus to be the most effective pulpit from which to preach, he frequently led weeklong evangelist meetings at universities in Australia, Asia, Africa, North America and elsewhere around the world. One event drew as many as 18,000 students. Until 2003 he was an active vice president of the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students.

“I declare myself an impenitent believer in the power of preaching,” he told an evangelical group in New York in 2006, by then a frail and stooped figure walking with a cane. “The pew cannot rise higher than the pulpit.”

Mr. Stott, a leading evangelical theologian, was regarded as the framer of the Lausanne Covenant, a declaration of the movement’s beliefs and global aspirations. Drafted in Switzerland in 1974 at an international evangelical congress, it is regarded as a 20th-century milestone of evangelicalism.

Mr. Stott was the author of about 50 books published in 65 languages. Among his best known are “Basic Christianity” (1958), “Christ the Controversialist” (1970) and “The Cross of Christ” (1986).

“Basic Christianity” alone has been translated into more than 60 languages and has sold more than 2.5 million copies, according to the John Stott Ministries, which said his books have sold more than eight million copies worldwide. His last book — he himself described it as such — was “The Radical Disciple: Some Neglected Aspects of Our Calling,” published in 2010.

“To read Stott is to see someone practicing ‘thoughtful allegiance’ to Scripture,” David Brooks wrote in The New York Times in an admiring column 1n 2004 titled, “Who Is John Stott?”

“For him, Christianity means probing the mysteries of Christ. He is always exploring paradoxes. Jesus teaches humility, so why does he talk about himself so much? What does it mean to gain power through weakness, or freedom through obedience? In many cases the truth is not found in the middle of apparent opposites, but on both extremes simultaneously.”

The books have become staples of evangelicalism, said David Neff, editor of the evangelical publication Christianity Today. “Almost anyone who is a leader in American evangelicalism has read those books and been shaped by them.”

John Robert Walmsley Stott was born in London on April 27, 1921, the youngest of three children of Sir Arnold W. Stott, a prominent physician and an agnostic, and his wife, Emily, a Lutheran who attended All Souls. His older sisters died before him. A lifelong celibate, he left no immediate survivors.

The young Mr. Stott originally intended to train for the diplomatic service, but influenced by the Christian Gospel, he changed plans while still in preparatory school, determined to enter the Anglican Church.

He graduated from Trinity College at Cambridge in 1943; transferred to Ridley Hall Theological College, also at Cambridge; and was ordained a minister in the Church of England in 1945. He started as an assistant curate at All Souls Church. After receiving a master’s degree at Cambridge in 1947, he advanced, at the age of 29, to rector of the church in 1950. When he turned rector emeritus in 1975, he moved from the rectory to a modest apartment over its garage.

The British government acknowledged his contributions in 2006 by naming him a Commander of the British Empire. He was appointed a chaplain to the queen in 1959 and served in that post until he reached retirement age in 1991. In 2005, Time magazine selected him as one of the world’s “100 Most Influential People.” He retired from the public ministry in 2007.

An avid birder and bird photographer, Mr. Stott took his binoculars and cameras on all his travels and wrote a book about the many species he encountered. Titled “The Birds Our Teachers: Biblical Lessons From a Lifelong Bird-Watcher” (1999), the book is illustrated with his own photographs.

At Mr. Stott’s death at the retirement home, his friends and associates were at his bedside, reading Scriptures and listening to Handel’s "Messiah," the All Souls Church Web site said.

“The evangelical world has lost one of its greatest spokesmen,” Mr. Graham said in a statement on Wednesday, “and I have lost one of my close personal friends and advisers. I look forward to seeing him again when I go to heaven.”

Dennis Hevesi contributed reporting

What is Emergent Christianity? Part 2

Reviewing Dr. Olson's comments on the Emerging Church or Emerging Movement has made me feel "right at home" with his passion and desire to see the best for God's people. Though we are "denominationally unrelated" and "strangers to one another" I have discovered in him a brother in the Lord willing to put aside all doctrine and conventions in order to re-discover God as God, without man's institutes or institutions. (This seems most demonstrable to me in the type of young men and women whom he has taught and discipled now serving the Lord in their many capacities). For we both have come out of backgrounds that have rigorously examined Scriptures and Church history and yet still feel the need that our studies have not been enough. Not that we would abandon our knowledge, so much as to improve our knowledge, to be more open to the times and movements allowable to the eras and insights of our day among seeking men and women. And in what Dr. Olson and others like Gibbs and Bolger have expressed, I like the smell of it, the heartbeat of it, the taste of it, at least in its generalizations and thematic expressions.

As reported, the Emerging Church Movement crosses all denominational lines and at its center is its reaction to either, too rigid or, too progressive, expressions of the Christian faith. For biblical faith is neither (1) restrictive - as proposed by modern day evangelicalism, nor (2) so loose and amorphous as to be useless, subjective, endlessly open-ended - as proposed by liberalism and mainline denominations. Emergent Christianity senses that it must "put aright" the extremes of conservative-and-liberal-expressions of Scriptures, God, Worship and Faith in general. (This was also observed by NT Wright in his article on the "Authority of the Scriptures" as earlier reported on this blog).

Secondly, the Emerging Church Movement is the POSITIVE expression of its faith shown below in its characterizations 1-5 as witness by Dr. Olson and concurred to by myself. For both our personal and corporate faith must be (1) self-critical and introspective; (1b) non-conformist to legalistic religious conventions; (2) separate from the world (or world era) that we live within (whether modern or postmodern; while at the same time utilizing the good found within those eras); (3) open to the Spirit of God's leading and impress upon our lives, thoughts and heart as it flows in line with the Scriptures (a most critical point, I might add); (4) a faith that is spiritually transformative and reformative; (5) and lives and breathes within communal worship, ministry, acts of charity, outreach, and very life itself.

This to me is what Emergent Christianity is, as I believe we can find in many churches from the ages past - regardless of label or distinction - and we pray to find in churches future. These are some (but not all) of the spiritual hallmarks of Christ's living body, his bridegroom and beloved, what we call the Church universal, and of His remnant people we call believers and followers of Jesus.

- skinhead

**********

More Thoughts on the Emerging Churches Movement

http://www.patheos.com/community/rogereolson/2011/08/07/more-thoughts-on-the-emerging-churches-movement/

by Roger Olson

August 7, 2011

First, is it even really a movement? If so, it’s a very amorphous one!

Second, I strongly recommend that people wanting to discuss the Emerging Church Movement (or, ECM) (or conversation or network or whatever you want to call the phenomenon) read this: Emerging Churches: Creating Christian Community in Postmodern Cultures by Eddie Gibbs and Ryan K. Bolger (Baker, 2005). It’s the best book I know of on the ECM; it’s written on the basis of exhaustive research including extended interviews with leading emergent/emerging church leaders.

Today I will be on Doug Pagitt’s radio program out of Minneapolis. I’m not sure what we will talk about, but I’m glad to be interviewed–especially if I can sneak in a word or two about my forthcoming book Against Calvinism! Of course, most of you know Pagitt is a leader looked up to by many in the ECM. I have been privileged to get to know him over the past several years. We don’t see eye-to-eye on some things, but I appreciate his search for authenticity in contemporary Christianity and church life.

As Gibbs and Bolger make abundantly clear, the ECM is not monolithic; it is a movement made up of very different congregations with a few exemplary things in common. I would say one of those is a determination to be authentic with Christianity and church life and to discard all that is merely traditional (“traditionalism”) and institutional (focus on survival for its own sake).

Gibbs and Bolger offer several brief, “nutshell” definition-descriptions of emerging churches. Here is one: “emerging churches are missional communities arising from within postmodern culture and consisting of followers of Jesus who are seeking to be faithful in their place and time.” (p. 28) Remember that no single definition-description is going to fit all emerging churches equally or in the same way. And there are certainly non-ECM congregations that would fit that description.

The first congregation I remember reading about that was described as “emerging” or “emergent” was Minneapolis’ Spirit Garage. (Google it!). Spirit Garage began in the mid-1990s as a mission to Uptown by the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America. There’s proof that SOME emerging churches are definitely rooted in the so-called “mainline” of American religion. (However, I think there’s something anomalous about anyone involved in the ECM calling anything “mainline” because if being postmodern means anything it means rejecting the very idea of “mainline” anything. “Mainline” is never a merely descriptive label; it always carries the connotation that what is so described is normative.)

Another early emergent church I encountered was House of Mercy which began at First Baptist Church of St. Paul (where I was a member for some years)–an American Baptist congregation. eventually left that church and denomination and has since associated itself more (if anything) with the Presbyterian tradition community. Like Spirit Garage, House of Mercy began in the mid-1990s and gained a lot of attention because of its willingness to experiment and embrace non-traditional forms of Christian life and worship. It attracted many young (and not so young) Christians interested in the arts.

Then, of course, emergent churches exploded across the American and British landscape. (I’m not implying that those two emerging churches were somehow the “originals” of which everything else is copy; I’m just saying I first became aware of the ECM through them.)

Many of my students have gone on to pastor or co-pastor or somehow lead emerging churches around the country. I have spoken in a number of those and at retreats and gatherings of emerging church leaders and church planters.

One things is painfully obvious to anyone who knows much about the ECM: It is very difficult to generalize about these congregations. As soon as you say anything about the movement as a whole you’ll encounter someone or something that doesn’t fit the description. However, as Gibbs and Bolger helpfully point out, certain common features or family resemblances TEND to be true of MOST of these congregations and ministries.

Again, I strongly recommend that people interested in understanding what these common features and family resemblances are read Emerging Churches by Gibbs and Bolger. (Yes, I know there are other books on this phenomenon, but I have found this one most helpful for now.)

I think there is a general fear among some observers that the ECM will fail to make the kind of impact it could have IF its leading spokespersons simply ally it too closely with already existing Christian movements whether conservative evangelical or so-called “mainline liberal” (or establishment progressive Christianity). One of the promises of the ECM is to develop a form of Christianity and church life that is constantly and forever adaptable which implies frequent, ongoing internal examination and openness to especially internal critique.

One of the failures of traditional forms of Christianity is being closed to criticism and calls for change. Conservative evangelicalism tends to be convinced it is already wholly right (or was at some point in the past). It at least appears impervious to even internal constructive criticism of its traditions. So-called mainline, progressive, liberal Christianity tends also to be convinced it is or has been wholly right–at least about its basic methods and approaches that have to do with adapting to modernity.

If the ECM offers anything new it has to be AT LEAST forging a third alternative (not necessarily a “via media”) to these “right” and “left” wings of contemporary Christianity.

Some emerging churches and leaders work out of a generally evangelical background. Some work out of a generally so-called “mainline” background. Hopefully, however, none of them will succumb to the temptation to align themselves too closely with the established hierarchies and traditions of these movements. Hopefully they will keep a critical “distance,” as it were, and refuse even financial support from anyone who requires them to toe a party line. Hopefully they will resist the subtle temptation even unconsciously to adopt the habits of either the “left” or the “right” of contemporary church life and thought.

I am of the opinion that SOME emerging churches and their leaders HAVE ALREADY succumbed to the temptation to develop a veneer of being different (avant garde, radical, etc.) while adopting the ways of conservative evangelicalism beneath the surface. SOME others have succumbed to the same temptation with regard to so-called mainline, progressive, liberal Protestantism. What I mean is, these emerging congregations (I’m not going to name them here–if the shoe fits, wear it or put it on someone you know!) LOOK very non-conformist but are actually very conformist in their beliefs and practices beneath the surface. In other words, just wearing a certain kind of glasses and using PowerPoint during sermons and mouthing naughty words occasionally DOES NOT make you emergent! Neither does adopting Celtic spirituality (whatever that is, exactly!) or worshiping in a dark space with scores of candles and a dozen TV monitors. Being truly emergent MUST mean something more than these surface features put on top of either conservative or progressive foundations. These CAN be present, of course, but what makes a congregation or mission or organization truly “emergent” MUST be below the surface at the deep level of commitment.

1 - I would argue that one such commitment MUST be self-criticism and willingness frequently to change combined with rejection of hierarchical models of leadership or absolutizing of tradition or being new and different for their own sakes.

2 - Another commitment MUST be rejection of modernity as the foundation or norm for belief and life and mission and service. Both conservatives and progressives have (often unwittingly and even against their own intentions) adopted modernity as the cultural norm even for Christianity and church life.

3 - What will that mean? It must mean an openness to new things the Spirit of God wants to do among his people that do not fit the modern box. It must mean a refusal of control, manipulation and orderliness.

4 - It must mean a refusal to reduce Christianity to either doctrine or ethics and a determination to discover it as transformative spirituality that is not privatized or individualized.

5 - It must mean attempts to discover the meaning of true community without confining structures, rules and protocols that put these before persons and relationships.

Devising a Meaning for Architecture in Helsinki's "Escapee"

Music Video for Architecture in Helsinki's 'Escapee'

Directed by Marcus Soderlund

Produced by Jules de Chateleux
Taken from the 2011 album 'Moment Bends'

 * * * * * * * * * * *

My First Impressions

by R.E.Slater

When first watching the music video Escapee by Architecture in Helsinki I only heard light-hearted beats and saw a young boy in the joys of peddling a bright red bicycle with bouncing blue balloons tied to its frame flying behind him in the jet streams of his joyous ride. Right then I new I was in for a metaphorical ride as the video cut and panned between two different adult figures intermixed with the band itself as our tour guide. Was I listening to the heartbeats of first love by a young man rethinking his first experiences (adult 1) or to an older adult (adult 2) weighed down with the inner turmoil of lost dreams unrealized and undiscovered much later in life? Or perhaps watching the first really awakening dreams of childhood's youthful promise that could fill the constellations of heaven above with its own weightless joys and spirited gladness? Or even a deposed life succumbed to the ravages of earth-bound realities believing age and maturity to have shredded childhood's distant hopes and beliefs? Someone who was destined no longer to ride the brighter boyhood dreams of youth but the lonely mechanistic backstreets and forgotten alleyways of unhappy griefs and dooms forever lost and forlorn in the decorum of societal norms?

I then wondered, "Is it so simple a thing to escape from this world's dark clutches of unbelief that would bind us forever in its darker beliefs of uncertainty?" Or can music, love, faith and a reconstitution that comes from God re-capture, and re-vitalize, our darkened lives with magical bikes and flying balloons. Nifty blue parkas and boyish haircuts. Or even the indescribable joys of riding the old, familiar passageways with a newer outlook on life? That refuses to sit in the metaphysical chairs of dismay and disappointment but would rise up to discover again the bright red bicycles of our childhood fantasies... yet this time bound within the surer bonds of God's love and embrace. Not the delusions of our own strength, or life's bleakness, nor even a darker world's many vaunted vanities and overwhelming temptations! A space where we might learn again to ride the fair streets of childhood as we once had been created to ride by our Creator God - especially with gay blue balloons flying behind our boundless imaginations! And with gladdened hearts released to the realities of promise in faith's majesty found only in a Creator's heart and soul as He had once made us to be and experience!

Here then is the inescapable reality of life's enigmas and mysteries that God loves us and in that love we will find our creative being and purpose as we become escapees from this life's heartbreaks and disillusionments. So then, break off the chains and locks of unbelief, and release that metaphorically-redemptive bike onto the back streets where we first discovered to ride from beneath heaven's home and across life's steely skies to vividly burn with faith's living hopes of unhesitating belief in personal renewal grounded in the God of our boundless reality!

R.E. Slater

August 7, 2011

Architecture in Helsinki - Escapee

Escapee Lyrics

This escapee was never gonna stay

On the unfamiliar building on the rooftop

Where we laid right off

Constellation shined and paved the way

Temptation's not a word

Until we've let it go astray

And I want to lead it

He want to lead it

Whoa, ho, ho

Like old tower over you all day

All darkness can be difficult like needles in the hay

I need to flick the switch and show you how to hide

And love is not the answer if you're takin' me for a ride

For a ride

This escapee was never gonna stay

On the night it'd be too typical to be stuck in a day

And while the competition's overcome what may

Temptation's not a word until we've let it go astray

I want to leave it

He want to lead it

Whoa, ho, ho

Unescaping, you're escaping

Unescaping

You're takin' me for a ride

For a ride

Unescaping, you're escaping

For a ride

Unescaping, you're escaping

For a ride

Unescaping, you're escaping

Unescaping, you're escaping



Send "Escapee" Ringtone to your Cell

More About the Band

 

Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_in_Helsinki

Musica Reviews

REVIEW 1

http://www.thevine.com.au/music/clip-reviews/architecture-in-helsinki's-'escapee'-and-'moment-bends'-track-by-track-_-watch20110612.aspx
by Marcus, on Jun 12 2011

Architecture in Helsinki's second single from their most recent pop slab Moment Bends, comes in the form of album track No. 2 'Escapee'. Filmed in Belgium, the clip was directed by Marcus Soderlund (The xx, Mike Snow) and features the band performing in damp suburbia, as a backdrop to a father/son tale involving forbidden bicycle riding, blue balloons and sweet parkas.

MILANO ACOUSTICS: Architecture in Helsinki - Escapee 

The band have also just released a mini-EPK type thing for Moment Bends. It consists of three band members—Cameron Bird, Kellie Sutherland and Gus Franklin—staring down the barrel and riffing on various word games connected to each track from their new album. Non sequiturs such as "it's as if I'm asleep on a raft floating across a river towards a glowing power station" and "a non space where magic and perfect moments can happen" litter proceedings, along with small visual hiccups and quirks. Meaning, it's good—if you're a fan. Or just really like sky blue.

REVIEW 2

http://www.eatingthebeats.com/2011/06/drinking-tunes-summer-beer-music/

On their recent LP Moment Bends, Architecture in Helsinki shed some of their super-twee roots in favor of pure dance-pop — and it’s a great fit. “Escapee” is perfect for a summer party, with lyrics about looking at constellations on a rooftop, getting out the dark, and escaping.

REVIEW 3 

http://www.inanabsolutworld.pedestrian.tv/pop-culture/news/watch-architecture-in-helsinki-escapee/44381.htm

Architecture In Helsinki's insightful track-by-track breakdown of Moment Bends calls this "the Nescafe Blend 43 moment on the record. We just added water and there was an instant buzz.". Tasty. Frontman Cameron Bird also associates this track with dolphins. Sadly no water mammals appear in the song's Marcus Soderlund directed video but we'll always settle for hazy bike rides with popular culture's most romanticized escapee not named Andy Dufresne, the adolescent runaway. Pedal til you legs fall off little man.

REVIEW 4 

tv/music/news/architecture-in-helsinkis-track-by-track-breakdown/43305.htm

ESCAPEE This was the Nescafe Blend 43 moment on the record. We just added water and there was an instant buzz. Sometimes songs happen in 10 minutes like some sort of crazy chemical reaction, 'Escapee' was as instantaneous and un-complicated as songs happen in our our world. Probably why it still makes me feel so good when I hear it! For some reason, every time I hear this it makes me think of dolphins.

REVIEW 5

http://www.serialoptimist.com/music/so-approved-architecture-in-helsinki-escapee-4981.html

Melbourne natives Architecture In Helsinki released their fourth album Moment Bends in April, and is already being talked about as one of the best modern pop albums of the year. Recorded over a two year period, Moment Bends is in large part “A dialogue with the dance floor, without being a slave to any particular rhythm.” The just released video for their song “Escapee” (directed by Marcus Soderlund, who has recently been creating great videos for The xx, Miike Snow, and jj) is a toe-tapping, fun track that the band says “was as instantaneous and un-complicated as songs happen in our world. Probably while it makes us feel so good when we hear it!” It’s makes us feel pretty good too. Enjoy!

REVIEW 6

http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/reverb/2011/06/tell_me_about_that_song_archit.php

A lot went into writing your favorite song--but how much do you really know about it? This week Cameron Bird and Kellie Sutherland of Architecture in Helsinki delve into hidden vocals, pesky guitar solos, and first-time key changes in their new song, "Contact High." (Check out Eric Grandy's take on the song here ).

Song: Contact High
From album: Moment Bends
Release date: May 2011
When it was written: January 2010
Where it was written: In our studio, Buckingham Palace
Why it was written: Is this a trick question?
Favorite line in the song: There is a hidden backing vocal that rips off Mutt Lange/Shania Twain in the last chorus.
Which part was the hardest to come up with? Getting the right flow in guitar solos are always difficult!
If you could go back and change anything, what would it be? Nothing. We spent a month on it in the studio so we wouldn't have any regrets.
Odd fact about song: It's the first-ever key change in an AIH song
What inspired the song: The magic of the natural universe
The overall meaning of the song: The chemistry between two brand-new lovers

REVIEW 7

http://www.ticketmaster.com/Architecture-In-Helsinki-tickets/artist/970586

Short Biography

Currently in the midst of a massive tour encompassing the USA, Russia, Europe and the UK, modernist pop quintet Architecture in Helsinki are thrilled to announce their most extensive Australian tour in years. After stunning crowds on the Groovin' The Moo tour and a brief run of headline dates in May, including a dazzling show at the Opera House as part of Vivid, AIH will be trekking across Australia over August and September.

The band's second single Escapee has just been released from their pop opus ‘Moment Bends', accompanied by a beautiful video directed by Marcus Soderlund (The XX, Miike Snow) in Belgium. As effortless and infectious as a pop song can be, Escapee was the last track written and recorded during the albums' two year gestation. Frontman Cameron Bird says, "Sometimes songs happen in 10 minutes like some sort of crazy chemical reaction, 'Escapee' was as instantaneous and un-complicated as songs happen in our world. Probably why it still makes me feel so good when I hear it!".

Supported by triple j and Channel [V], the tour will see the band hitting up most capital cities, along with rare performancesin Cairns, Wollongong, and Newcastle. Don't miss this chance to see why the world's falling in love with ‘Moment Bends' and Architecture in Helsinki's transcendently joyous live shows.

In-depth Biography

The Australian indie pop ensemble Architecture in Helsinki hail from Fitzroy, Melbourne, and have counted multi-instrumentalists Cameron Bird, James Cecil, Gus Franklin, Isobel Knowles, Jamie Mildren, Sam Perry, Tara Shackell, and Kellie Sutherland among their ranks. The band's musical arsenal is even bigger than its roster, featuring instruments as diverse as analog synths and samplers, glockenspiel, tuba, clarinet, and recorder along with the more predictable drums, bass, and guitar. Architecture in Helsinki began playing in 2000, crafting a mix of indie, electronic, and pop that they recorded and occasionally performed live. The collective began recording its debut album, Fingers Crossed, in 2002 in a variety of places ranging from beach houses to proper studios; Bar/None released the album in spring 2004. Following a hectic year of touring and recording, the group turned around another album, In Case We Die, in 2005. The release drew glowing reviews, fixing Architecture in Helsinki as one of that year's most promising and idiosyncratic indie acts. Frontman and primary songwriter Bird relocated to Brooklyn a year later, where he and producer James Cecil put the finishing touches on the group's third effort, Places Like This. The album was released on Polyvinyl in 2007. Bird returned to Australia and the group, now a quintet including Perry, Mildren, Sutherland, and Franklin, released the That Beep single in 2008. They recorded their fourth album in their studio, Buckingham Palace, over the course of two years. The result was Moment Bends, which was released in early 2011. ~ Heather Phares, Rovi

REVIEW 8

http://lamusicblog.com/2011/06/video/architecture-in-helsinki-release-video-for-escapee/

by Kristin Houser, on June 2nd, 2011
Category: Video

Architecture in Helsinki’s music perfectly suits my dancing style (I flatter myself to think there is any “style” to my dancing, but that’s beside the point). Not too fast, not too fancy, just perfectly infectious melodies over beats that keep my feet moving without knocking me off them. “Escapee,” the third single from the band’s 2011 release Moment Bends, is perfectly in keeping with this trend, and the video for the track, which features a red bike, blue balloons, and some understated ’80s-influenced outfits and hairstyles, is pretty awesome too. 

Andrea Bocelli - The Lord's Prayer

In concert with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir,

Salt Lake City, Utah

Christmas Concert, Dec 2009

Can the emergent church movement take constructive criticism?

http://www.patheos.com/community/rogereolson/2011/08/02/can-the-emergent-church-movement-take-constructive-criticism/

by Roger Olson

August 2, 2011

I’m sure it can. However, I’m made to wonder when I see some of the responses to Brandon Morgan’s guest post here (of about a week ago -cf. http://relevancy22.blogspot.com/2011/07/emergent-church-movement-challenged-by.html) and my follow up post. Brandon, a leader of the Void Collective and known to be a participant in the emergent movement, dared to raise some questions about the direction in which at least some emergent church leaders are taking the movement.

One well-known emergent leader responded very defensively at his blog. I think he put the worst spin possible on Brandon’s and my questions. And he didn’t really answer those questions.

I know Brandon’s intention (and I hope mine as well) was to create dialogue about the direction of portions of the emergent church movement; it was not to express “disappointment” so much as to urge caution and clarification.

One would hope that, of all religious movements, the emergent movement would be open to internal, constructive criticism framed in the form of questions (which were not merely rhetorical). In fact, it seems to me one of the hallmarks of emergent Christianity is self-criticism. Brandon is part of the movement. I am a sympathizer. (I wouldn’t say I’m part of it as I am a member of a fairly traditional moderate Baptist church.) Surely it’s okay for a participant in the movement who has demonstrated his status through helping found and lead the Void Collective (mentioned by the New York Times in connection with emergent Christianity!) to raise constructive criticisms and invite conversation about them. If not, and if the only response is defensiveness, then that raises serious questions about the movement’s distinctiveness.

I had hoped that some leaders of the emergent movement would respond here so dialogue could take place about the questions Brandon raises. Instead, so far, the leaders Brandon (and I) queries have only responded defensively at their own blogs. (I am sure I may have missed some more positive responses elsewhere, but why not here?)

One of my main qualms about traditional churches (denominations, congregations, institutions) is that the leaders tend to close ranks and shut off even constructive criticism. One thing I hope will be true of the emergent movement is the opposite–openness to constructive criticism and willingness to consider the possibility that it needs course adjustment from time to time.