Lent 2, 2013
A couple of years ago
while I was working at St. Alban’s, we had a day long retreat with a man by the
name of Peter Rollins. Not to be confused with Henry Rollins, the one time lead
singer of the punk band Black Flag—however, in a way, Peter Rollins has become
something of a ‘rock star’ in the emergent church world.
He’s known for a number
of books and articles, not to mention his speaking engagements—and he’s even
been called the “darling” of the emergent church movement.
And while I’d say that
I agree with a lot of what Peter Rollins says, there are some things that I
have a hard time accepting. Nothing opposed to orthodox faith, necessarily—but stuff,
which betrays a lack of understanding about the Church in a more universal
sense.
Now, just to give you
some idea of who Peter Rollins is; he’s from Northern Ireland and spent a lot
of time in academe studying philosophy and theology and has made a name for
himself writing on both of these subjects as they relate to the modern Church.
Where he has become
particularly well known is in the emergent church movement—this group of people
who are trying to postulate how the Church can remain relevant in our culture
today…
Anyway, like a lot of
emergent church writers, Peter Rollins spends a lot of time dazzling hip, young
Evangelical pastors by talking about lofty and inspired ideas. He asks
pertinent questions about how and why the Church acts and reacts in certain
ways—and he even rightly challenges some of the conventions of the modern
Church.
Like I said, it sounds
inspired—and in reality it is—because none of it is new.
In fact, much of what Peter Rollins talks
about in his work is exactly what many of the writers and thinkers of the Early
and Medieval Church were writing in their time.
So, inspired? Yes—but
not new.
After reading some of
Peter Rollins’ stuff, I would say that he would be the first to agree. In fact,
much of the thesis of his book “How (not) to speak of God” references Christian
Mystics and Early Church Fathers to make his arguments.
The problem that I
find, however, as I mentioned earlier, is that writer’s like Peter Rollins
portray a very limited vision of the Church. Understandably, like other
emergent Church writers, he’s coming from an Evangelical perspective. So, there
isn’t this present sense of tradition and connection to the historic Church—and
outside of academic institutions, theological resources are somewhat limited. So,
we have to keep all of these things in mind when we talk about his work and
popularity.
And while I’m picking
on Peter Rollins specifically(who is still one of the more promising emergent
church writers), he’s only representative of a wider conversation which seems
to continue to get stuck in the trap of trying to make the Church ‘relevant.’
It’s this particular
idea of relevance that I find most interesting—mostly because it seems to be
the rallying cry of so many Church institutions these days. This idea that we
need to make ourselves more relevant to the culture so that we can reclaim some
glory that we had in the past…
For many groups this
often means changing the physical space in which people meet, and even
re-imagining how a church service is done.
Others still—many in
mainline and more traditional denominations have decided that the best course
of action is to start doing what many Evangelical churches did in the 1970s and
80s with the inclusion of “Contemporary Christian Music” in worship services—as
well as more informal, conversational sermons.
Unfortunately, as I
said, these were innovations in the 1970s and 80’s. And seeing as membership
decline isn’t just the problem of the traditional churches, anymore; it
questions just how inspired such a plan of action really is…
All the same, a couple
of issues begin to emerge out of this. One issue is that, as the Church, it
seems we’re really not very clear about our own identity. So either we’ve done
a terrible job of keeping that discussion of identity constantly in front of us
as a reminder; or we’ve confused our true identity with who we think we ought
to be.
The second issue is
related to the first, and that is this problem of confusing relevance with
faddism.
In other words, there
is this sense that our culture needs Jesus Christ to show up with a 5 o’clock
shadow and skinny jeans before we’ll listen to him. The problem here, of course
(beyond the satire) is that if we begin to constantly try to institutionalize
things that are passing like fads, we’re doomed to perpetual irrelevance.
However, the staying
power of the work of people like Peter Rollins, is that the message of God’s
salvation is far more relevant in its simplicity than we could ever try to make
it. It turns out, when people experience that truth, imbedded in the work of
the emergent church, or anywhere for that matter, they are naturally attracted
to it.
Because no matter how
our culture and society changes—what never changes is the need for hope and
love. More importantly, we will always need to have meaning for our lives, as
well as the hope that we somehow matter in the grander scheme of things.
This is why we’re
called, as the Church, to be a structure that rests on a solid foundation, so
that we can offer stability in a constantly shifting world.
This isn’t to say that
we shouldn’t be self-aware, and prepared to grow beyond unnecessary things to
stay true to the Gospel. The world shouldn’t starve spiritually
because we’re afraid to kill sacred cows. Sometimes we need to make holy
hamburgers…
But as long as we can
focus on being faithful to live into the basic call of loving God with all of
our hearts, souls and minds; and loving our neighbor as ourselves—I believe the
extraneous, gimmicky trappings of church will not matter anymore. Because the
issue of relevance will always be answered in our constant longing to fulfill
the command to love, and to point beyond ourselves to the Living God in our
worship and in our lives…something that will always speak to our culture and to
our world.
