I say we call it Squizzy... Forget pomo language, it's too problematic. We need to be squizzy about how we practice our faith. Of course I'm open to other suggestions. Flueberdink anyone?
i hate to bring this up, but i can say pblpblpldbldpldbpdb.
LOL!!! You're absolutely right. My advertising background sneaks in once again. I'd try to step outside myself again and come up with something else but I fear my psyche will slip again and reveal some other little community I've been a part of. I like your idea of just not saying anything. Why don't we all shut up for a while and just go about the business of being Christlike. And when cornered for an answer we just say "oh we can't say that it's too holy".
"what is a post-modern church?"
No...No...wait...wait...I've got it. How about we just make the "locking the lips" action like turning a key and then throwing it away. Then we could let them know that they need to go look for the key to unlock the answer. Challenging.
I liked this question: "what does a church look like that is trying to be faithful in the postmodern context/culture?" That is closer to what I think the focus should be. Although, I am still not convinced that being "imitators of Christ" would, or should, look any different than in any other era.
It is interesting that we are engaging in an issue of language / linguistics and nomenclature. If anything, the pomo shifts have shown us that language is often much more fluid, porous, and obtuse in its ability to capture meaning. In many ways, missionaries and anthologists have shown us how localized language really is and how easy it is to assume you understand what someone means based on the idea that words contain their meaning. One of the key elements of a pomo church I believe is a real visceral dialogue on a local level about the language of the holy. The import and power of language comes from a communal sense of agreement regarding meaning and knowing. Christians have assumed that truth to someone in Asia is the same as truth to someone in Seattle. Or even more contained, that truth to someone in Berkeley is the same as truth to someone in Boise.
The idea that truth is ultimately objective, floating out there in space only waiting for someone to discover it via the throwing off of prejudice and tradition is what the postmodern church calls into question. As silly as the squizzilies can get, that conundrum of meaning drives us to see dialogue as sacred and community as vital for meaning & truth to go beyond personal ruminations. Why am I not surprised Carlson introduced us to the SQUIZZLIES????
Does this mean we have to talk to one another? I'd be okay with that as long as we code our communications. After all, aren't we living in exile? Why not develop a secret language much like prisoners do or the way slaves communicated with each other throughout the oppression of slavery. How do you think Moderate Muslims feel about Osama Bin Laden running around co-opting their faith language. Why should we let others in on our territory? I say we squizzy our lives together and live boostanfully knowing that that thing we can't say is reigning aardopopitly.
Sounds like Gnosticism is raising its head again.
In some ways you are responding to the church's attempt to bring relevance to its message. In one sense, the holy will always be "un" relevant. Modernist attempts to make sure "everyone gets it" often dumb down the holy till it is much like therapeutic language. Josh McDowel's Evidence that Demands a Verdict is one of these attempts to make accessible the holy such that anyone who is reasonable and intelligent will understand that he is a sinner and merely repent as an act of objective, reasoned behavior modification.
There needs to be a re centering of the mysterious. Awe and fear of God are ideas that for the modernist just make God to inaccessible and frightening Well??????? Who do you want to worship? Jerry Falwell's older more gentler brother or a God who is called a HOLY FIRE?
the same when he was at up/rooted, but it is instructive none-the-less.
something we have to embrace.
won't work, that is just one more modern strategy. It is something else."
nice work, and what is a "book artist"?
at the january up/rooted gathering Stephen Long said that post modernity helps us to rightly name modernity (which refers to what Bunker was saying about language), but is unable to move beyond it.
so what does that mean for the church? you guys figure it out.
It is interesting to note that we know what a postmodern church is not yet we are not certain, in any specificity, what it is. I think one would also have to say that a church could posses all of the below mentioned practices and still be within the realm of a postmodern church. To say that these are "just a superficial cultural accommodation to MTV or GenX." doesn't seem to address much. The "church" should never BE the building or the technology within no matter how many of these gimmicks one may posses. The church should not also BE the high road of minimalism and art. The church is ìthe bride of Christî and we should live as a bride should live waiting for her groom, in purity!
Young people are always looking for something new. Many young people a generation ago (generation being used loosely) fled the traditional churches for those of the evangelical format. Worship preferences may change but God does not and I am not certain as to how the truth of Christ would change either.
I do not know if I agree to this idea of a post-modern church as much as I think followers of Christ living, in purity and grace, should learn how to be followers of Christ is a postmodern society, which doesnít exist throughout the world.
Ancient rituals. I have heard this mentioned several times in the past regarding the postmodern church and I would like to know - what are the desired ancient rituals and their significance?
Thanks for the dialogue. It is quite interesting.
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously!
for the church? you guys figure it out."
device wouldn't it? A descriptive way of describing who we are and why rather than a prescriptive means of framing who we are and why properly.
In this light: why do we have to figure this out? What exactly is there to figure out? That is where I keep hitting a brick wall, I simply don't know what the "right" question to ask is.
1. This brother has a drinking problem, how can I help him?
2. How can I be a better preacher?
3. This sister is sick, how can we help her?
4. How should we worship?
5. How can we be involved with evangelism?
wisdom of scripture and the experience of other leaders. Now here is my question: is the question of post-modernity one of these basic practical questions, or is it something else? Do we make this issue more complicated then it actually is. How fundamental is this question to the life of our local church? From one perspective it is not fundamental at all.
For Long it is one of these practical questions. His answer to your question Geoff is simply the whole communitarian/Amish thing. And he would answer the question: "What does this mean for the church?" By saying: "It means we have to embody a Christian ethic, not a modernist one because these two things have become identical in modern ecclesiology."
(p.s. a "Book Artist" is one who treats the creation of books and literary material as one of the Fine Arts rather than what is known as the "Shop Arts" (woodworking, leathercraft, etc...) It is a growing national movement that actually has a lot of leaders in Chicago.
Who do you want to worship? Jerry Falwell's older more gentler brother or a God who is called a HOLY FIRE?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I wish I'd said that.
Being Christlike. Yea, yea that is the bottom line. BUT instead of saying anything at all how about we just shrug our shoulders?
yes, i think being christlike is the goal, and that too often we focus on other things. We strain out the nats of epistemplogy, language, and the culturally chiche, but forget the weightier things like justice, righteousness, and faithfulness.
i agree and disagree. Being imitators of Christ might be similar to other era, and i would say that with some of the pomo corrective to modern Christian, we again are more able to pursue that imitation. (this would be a holistic expression of the gospel and the kingdom of God, an embodied spirituality rather than congitive, and an embracing of diversity) but i disagree because each era has its own strengths and weaknesses, and while there is an eternal Gospel, each era response to that gospel is temporal, fallible (we call this Christianty). As on African theologian said, "the gospel is timeless, but Christiantiy is always a beggar."
would some else please comment on ritual and their significance?
essential... maybe... like worship and discipleship and fellowship.
gathering of christians, an ekklesia?
I may have misunderstood your assertion that the church should focus less on what it looks like so bear with me here as I am attempting to address an issue you may have not even desired to be addressed.
We must look like something. That has been the dark underbelly if you will of some of the Enlightenment's tendency to allow faith to be disembodied. However, with that being said, what we look like will not be universally shared as one common symbol system. Local enclaves will "look"different and should. The attempt to find one monolithic ubiquitous "look" is indeed a fruitless search. If you are responding to the over attention to form, aesthetic, and style over against lifestyle, character & virtue, I am with you on that.
so you guys are on the same wavelength.
in the world. it only matters as much as you have contact with it.
off to college to have their foundations destroyed.
superficial things and more emphasis on values.
While pondering you might want to consider the narrative implications of "ekklesia apart from form and structure." I look forward to your thoughts on this.
people share their lives and not just their sundays with each other.
periodically to continue to try and figure this faith thing out.
3. worship- there is a time set aside to encounter God. nuff said.
spiritual disciplines and spiritual growth.