CONTINUING TO REFLECT ON THE FUTURE OF DENOMINATIONS.
One Future for Denominations
In reading Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat I was struck with its implications for denominationalism. One of the problems facing all major denominations is that they are experienced as a top-down hierarchy in an age when such top-down structures are viewed with distrust by many people. According to Friedman, one of the significant realities contributing to the flattening of the world is the ability of the computer/internet/webpage development that is empowering the individual. In developing his thesis, he spoke of how through technology one can form communities of interest in a way that could reinvent civic life and reinvigorate our democracy. It provides the means by which the individual can participate in the larger process. He spoke of it in terms of politics and business, but it made me wonder about what could take place within the church.
DENOMINATIONS AND THE CHURCH
We see increasing evidence of individual churches charting their own course independent of their denomination. They even arrange their own international connections with other churches and communicate with them via the internet. What would be the impact of inviting individual Christians and churches to share in the struggle to make a corporate witness beyond that which is possible by one church? In essence, the denomination could bring before its membership the theological challenge of the witness of the denomination around a variety of concerns. For example, how should Christians reach out to other Christians who are suffering in Palestine while at the same time being sensitive to the concerns of their Jewish neighbors both in Israel and next door to many of our churches. (This was an issue that the Presbyterian Church has faced recently. Only the way that it happened was that a resolution was brought before the national body and the general membership was not even aware of the issue let alone having an opportunity to seek to have input to the actions of the church. Only after the national meeting voted did the various thoughts and feelings of the membership find expression. In many cases the responses were a negative reaction rather than a considered theological response.)
BREADTH OF CHRISTIANITY
What I am proposing is that one of the denomination’s tasks is the enabling of individual churches to experience the breadth of Christianity that is reflected in the larger Christian community. Thanks to technology, such a conversation is not restricted by geography or national boundaries. The Gospel sounds different to a person living in poverty or experiencing an oppressive national situation than it does to someone who experiences a relatively comfortable life. Yet the church is made up of believers from a great variety of contexts and each need to hear the other. Theologians and biblical scholars should be engaged to craft the faith issue at stake.
It should not be a question of a majority vote and the paralyzing of the church at the level of the lowest common denominator of its membership. Christians, like most citizens, respond first out of a combination of fear and perceived self-interest. But the task of the larger church, like the task of the pastor of an individual church, is to bring the gospel to bear on the issues that confront us. Since many members of local churches were not born into the denomination of the church to which they belong, they do not have any inherited loyalty to those who work beyond the local church. If they could be engaged in such an ongoing conversation, augmented perhaps by local pastors reflecting on such issues from the pulpit, they could begin to experience their membership in the larger community.
I’m sure this needs thought through much more thoroughly but this is a beginning of how we might learn to be the church at a time when hierarchal structures are dying.
Steve, I applaud your look into the future of worldwide Christianity. On the matters of belief and theological depth and spiritual growth, a lot is going on. I’d cite, for example, Richard Rohr’s website–which is broadly ecumenical and wonderfully thoughtful. (All denominations seem represented, and also non-Christian contemplative folks.)
BUT I also observe a hunger to do the missions that Christ called us to do. And leaders who are doing the hard work to pull folks together. Food. Care. Shelter.
One case that I know directly concerns the Niall Mellon Trust from Ireland. From 2002 to 2009, Mr Mellon organized worldwide volunteers to build about 14,000 homes for families in South Africa who had not been able to get out of tin-shack townships despite ANC promises and miniscule, piecemeal initiatives by local Anglican ministries since the 1994 end to apartheid. I have visited these safe, clean, fully 21st-C homes. Thousands of mostly CHRISTIAN volunteers flew to South Africa in teams from all manner of churches, at their own expense, and built 2,000 solid, code-approved homes each season. But the recession caused by banking fraud in 2008 choked off the mission .
The problem I see for Christians who seek to connect across town or across continents is safe, honest management of MONEY resources–the necessary budgets secure from hacking and fraud and recessions–in order to re-distribute world resources for the sick, the homeless, the hungry.
We can all nurture our faith and reach out to others for spiritual support and succor online–millions already do for the cost of a connection and a device (which other millions do NOT have access to). But seriously effective missions–even temporary ones like disaster relief–need staffs, offices, intercultural sophistication, and of course sustainable FAITH-in-ACTION. “Hierarchies” might be dying (not dictatorships, oddly), but well-structured leadership and relatively stable policies are neither “old” nor “so 20th-Century.” Distributed models of leadership still need to organize their resources and to marshal their adherents’ motivations.
To me, Friedman’s 2005 book was important for its time and raised good questions that you’ve properly re-voiced here. If I remember my two readings properly, he did not foresee the 2008 crash. With that sobering reality in mind, I am looking for real changes in denominational leadership, and for examples I regularly check in to see who is sustaining their great new ideas on . I commend that site to your readers. In faith.
Hmm — I provided two links in my post a few minutes ago, but they got erased when the comments actually posted. Here they are again:
Article from the Irish Times on the Niall Mellon Trust
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/building-charity-in-south-africa-loses-high-profile-help-1.762219
or
Presbyterian Church USA 1001 New Worshipping Communities
pcusa 1001 new worshipping communities
or
George Meese
Well said, George. A major issue that sticks out to me is the challenge of the loss of trust. While I agree that denominational leadership is important, perhaps critical, the problem is that we have a decreasing sense of trust of all institutions. I can’t think of any major institution that hasn’t been challenged by a major scandal in the last ten years–government, church, educational, sports, investment, etc.
One of the challenges for the church is how you rebuild trust when it is violated. As you are aware, with the internet, people are increasingly connecting with those who think like them and building their decisions on the basis of emotions rather than logic. One of the values of a connectional system is that it lifts us out of a silo mentality and challenges ego-centric decision making.
Let’s keep thinking.