The Emergent Conversation

In a post over at Pomomusings, Adam Walker Cleveland finds himself wondering about the state of the emergent/ emergence/ emerging thing.  That, in the event you've not been attending to it, was the brand spankling new churchy trend circa 2003 and 2004.  It was postmodern and relational, a simultaneous critique of the bureaucratic staleness of the oldline and the shiny consumer falseness of Big JesusPlex religion.

It seemed to have promise, back then.   Reflexive conservatism resisted it, as it does most things.  The liberal wing of the church gave it a big hug, as it does most things.  A community of like-minded souls formed.  Drums were played.  Incense was lit.  Polyvalent liturgies that explored the semiotics of meaning were earnestly explored in respectful dialogue, as participants liveblogged and tweeted earnestly, the bright apples glowing on the backs of their laptops.

And a community formed, woven together from shared interest and experience.   Their conversation continues, with a recent annual gathering.

Emergence, like Occupy, spoke into a deep and very widespread reaction to a troubling reality.  It rose in response to a gut-truth felt in the souls of many Jesus-folk, the truth that few of the current forms and the structures of the church were effectively articulating the reality of the Reign of God we're supposed to be manifesting.  It's why I got into it, why that little banner ad thing still sits for the time being on the right of this blog.

But like Occupy, what Emergence did not become was a movement.   It hasn't moved.  It has sustained, and maintained.  It remains, after ten years, essentially the same thing that it was when it began.

The "why" of this is a tick hard to nail down, but I think a substantial portion of that "why" lies in the intentional formlessness of emergence.

What is emergence?  No-one is quite sure, even after ten years of talking.  It seems to defy definition, at least in any meaningful way.

It has a hundred different definitions, all of which are equally valid.  The postmodern character of the conversation precludes the expression of a clear vision or direction, because articulating a clear vision would by necessity crowd out other possible visions.  The essential ethos of emergence is the open, non-judgmental sharing of theological perspective...and there's some real value in that.  There's also a significant focus on deconstruction and analysis.

But perhaps it is the conversational, deconstructive, and relational character  of emergence itself that prevents it from becoming a movement.

Movements arise when energies are directed towards a common purpose.  Movements rise up when human beings encounter something that offers to shape and give meaning to their existence.  And and wonderful and life-giving as those intentionally open-ended relational conversations are, what they do not seem to provide is the framework for channeling those conversational energies into a movement.

If you're intentionally eschewing norms and structures, a framework is unlikely to arise.

That may change, or shift.  But for now, it is what it is.  A continuing conversation.  So it goes.

Preaching and Third Rail Theology

This last week, I had a conversation I'd been anticipating with someone.   The question posed was where I stood on the whole "gay thing," and did I concur with my... um ... "evolving" denominational position on the subject?  And so we talked for a while.

I and my conversation partner did not share perspective on the issue, nor to my knowledge were any minds changed on the issue, but we did share prolonged conversation, and it was civil in disagreement.   Following the conversation, I found myself reflecting a bit on my own approach to preaching on the issues we argue about the most.   When it comes to the "gay thing," I really don't have it as a central theme of my preaching.  On occasion, I have.  I likely will again.  But it's not been a core theme for me.  Is this just pastoral wussiness?  Maybe.  But there are other things at play.

In part, this is because when I preach, I discipline myself to preaching from the fullness of the Bible. That means following the three year cycle of the Revised Common Lectionary, which touches on the entirety of Scripture.   If you do that, well, the "gay thing" is just not a central explicit theme.  Our culture-war obsession with it is entirely out of whack with the narrative of Scripture.  On a verse-weight scale, it's of considerably less significance than menstruation, skin disease, and the sin of Jeroboam son of Nebat.

So on 95% of Sundays, I stick to justice, grace, mercy, and Christ's radically inclusive love for the stranger and the outcast, and let folks figure it out for themselves.

But in larger part, it's because as much as I value preaching, I'm strongly aware that it has limitations.  If you're in a community of like-minded souls, or a community that has formed around one strong personality, then you can get away with preaching whatever you like, as did that preacher in the video making the rounds this week.  You know the one, the guy who suggested that gays should be rounded up and sent to concentration camps.  Sigh.  I have it on good authority that he'll be obligated to spend his forty-seven thousand years in purgatory preparing and delivering graphic Powerpoint sermons on menstruation, skin disease, and the sin of Jeroboam son of Nabat to a bored throng of texting succubi.

Whichever way, preaching can mask the truth of an exchange.  You can pitch out your passionately held position, and be strong and outrageous about the things you're "agin", and everyone will laugh and say Amen, except for those one or two souls who are silently seething on the receiving end.  I've inadvertently done that on occasion myself, and when I've been called on it, it's been a convicting moment.

But in authentic community, we're not all identical.  There's difference.  And where there's difference, there needs to be openness and conversation.  Otherwise, you're just monologuing.  I know, I know, you need to stand up and be counted.  You need to be a prophetic witness, an overturner-of-tables, a declarer of the Way Things Are.

I'm perfectly willing to do so in my writing here, and in conversations, and in small-group study.   And in sermons, but only if there's safe space for difference to be explored and expressed.   In these places, questions can be asked.  Disagreement can be articulated and explored.  I prefer it because it is both harder and the risk is higher.   The risk comes when you look at the other with eyes that are not glazed-over with the scales of your presuppositions, and see the depth of common being you both share.   Are we willing to have our assumptions about others changed as we engage with them across the boundary of difference?

The hardness comes in taking that into account.   This person you disagree with is another soul, no matter how you may differ, and even if you are strongly convicted of the inherent rightness of your position.   And if you allow yourself to really see them, and not have your eyes scaled over, then it becomes considerably more difficult to view them through the polarizing lenses of our adversarial, binary culture.

Trolls and the Holy Ghost Dialectic

One of the things the emergent church gets pinged on a great deal is our relentless focus on conversation. We chat. We gather. We discuss. We convene. The idea behind those conversations is to get to know the other, to open ourselves to who they are. In those exchanges, we find understanding of the other. More importantly, it is in conversations with those who are not exactly "us" that we can find the deepest and most potent movements of the Holy Spirit.

The problem for emergents, as I see it, is that we don't really quite grasp how significant the thing we're doing is. While this approach is a foundational and roots-rock approach to both proclaiming and living into the Reign of God, we keep it in house. We like to talk grace amongst ourselves, but often don't realize that the same grace needs to be intentionally applied to our more challenging relationships. It needs to be expressed outside of comfortable places, in relationships that go beyond cups of coffee or tasty microbrewed beer shared among like-minded people.

We need to be graceful to our trolls.

Trolls, as anyone in the blogosphere knows, are those true-believing souls who take it upon themselves to attack and subvert those who fail to meet the pureblood standards of their particular belief. I've had several over the years. I've had hard-core neoatheist trolls, who have mocked my faith and my stupid fake Easter bunny God. I've had hard-core fundamentalist trolls, who have hurled snippets of scripture and bitter invective in equal parts. I am currently in between trolls, although there are some recent promising prospects. Hi Mark!

It's easy...and, in it's own way, fun...to hammer on these folks when they show up. What is not quite so easy is to realize that when Jesus told us to love our enemies, he was talking about trolls. It's a tough thing to do. Our immediate and human desire is to go to war, to open up the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.

This is what the trolls want, although it isn't what they need. They look to the troll-lords on shout radio and shout-tv for inspiration. Trolls want to rant and bellow. Trolls want to find self-affirmation in a seething and closed-circle hatred of those who are different. As such, they are part and parcel of the cult of baseless self-esteem that has come to define our increasingly blighted society. But what they need is the same thing that we all need: the transforming grace of Christ and the Holy Spirit.

So...get to know your troll. Hold on to what is good, and defend what is right, but still be sure to show 'em a little lovingkindness. When they spit on that grace, offer up some more, and then some more after that. The font of our grace is, after all, infinite and without measure.

Evil is, after all, not overcome with more evil.