There are many good reasons for and ways of being separate from the world, I’ve never been comfortable with this way of insulating our most precious ideas.

Even in the best of the CofC tradition (we won’t talk about the worst), even when we speak “plainly” of things which aren’t “plain” there is still a mountain for the non-Christian to climb even to listen.

“church” is nothing more than “believers who gather together” in one context and “the larger group of all believers in the world” in another. You don’t have to be this wordy or awkward, but communication depends on a set of shared symbols. If they don’t understand what “church” means, then talking about the “church” isn’t meaningful to them.

If we read the New Testament, it seems to me we find the church was for believers. Believers didn’t bait non believers to come to the infotainment service so the preacher could get them to believe–they went out to nonbelievers and witnessed to them. I think seeker sensitive orientation is one of the major reasons churches aren’t effectively building up and equipping believers.

I am not sure that our use of individual Christian terms is the problem. First, do we really have an alternative? What words would we use in place of “sin,” “church,” and “baptism”? What words would capture the multiple layers and strong inter-dependence of these words? No, the problem I think you correctly note exists is not with the words themselves but with our failure to communicate the biblical story-line that provides the context within which the words have meaning. There is no “better” word for what Jesus told us to pray for than that the Father’s “kingdom” come. When an outsider wonders what we are talking about, a synonym or definition will not close the gap of understanding. In fact, as the present debates within Presbyterianism show, they will likely just close the mind. (That is not to say that definition has no value, but simply that it does not have all value.) No, we must keep telling the big story, weaving in the unavoidable Christianese that both gives meaning to the story and receives meaning therefrom.

I find in practice the matter to be effectively the opposite. That is, what you call “common” I call “insular”. I believe Christianese is one of the great barriers to evangelism and authentic worship. If you want “common” then use the words the World understands.

I’ve often thought I’d love to do my own translation(?) of the New Testiment eliminating all the exclusively Christian terms. I think I’m completely UNqualified to do this, but since no one else is doing it… it makes me despirate to fill the void.

Ask any old-school CofCer and they’ll tell you that even such words like “Sin”, “Church” or “Baptism” cause far more problems than they solve by being used in the place of plain speach. I won’t even start on “Sanctification” or purposefully obscure terms like “Supralapsarianism”, which I believe were invented and perpetuated by persons who use them to think they are closer to wisdom (and God) than people who can’t.

By all means, be Universal! Abandon Christianese.