Comments on: Open Mic at the iMonk Cafe: High Ecclesiology/Low Church Planting?

By: Chad Rushing

Chad Rushing — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 03:28:29 +0000

Without [Paul's] mop ups of those messy churches most of our NT wouldnâ€™t exist.

That is one of those funny truths of Church history that has always delighted me. If there were not perfect churches from the get-go, why should anyone expect them now?

By: Derek

Derek — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 18:38:47 +0000

Ah, but, Ross, culturally, Texas is much more Latino than the Irish and African American ethnic groups centered around Chicago. Heck, I’d even say that the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston’s size might be related to their proximity to the Mexican border.

By: Chaplain Mike

Chaplain Mike — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 03:11:34 +0000

I know of a church-planting movement in Brazil that emphasizes planting the church first, then going to school. I also know of a mission there whose policy used to be that you could not go to seminary until you had planted a church. They apparently wanted people hungry to learn with a hunger that far supercedes the academic.

By: JoanieD

JoanieD — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 11:40:36 +0000

Glad it made you laugh, Alan. I was hoping someone would get a kick out of it. And yes, I can see the hand scan thing getting into a movie too. Hey, you read it here first. If I happens, I am going to sue for royalties from the movie!

By: + Alan

+ Alan — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 04:22:27 +0000

Thanks for that, Joanie – I laughed out loud, literally. Somebody’s ‘gonna see this and put that scan the hand thing in a movie or something. ha. But you’re right – “God-pills”, Scripture, prayer, community, teaching, etc. – sooo many ways God pours His Life into us. Peace again.

By: JoanieD

JoanieD — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 03:12:48 +0000

+Alan said, “Itâ€™s OK to criticize things like this in your own faith tradition. It doesnâ€™t mean youâ€™re throwing it under the bus. It means you would love to see certain things improve where they need to improve â€“ and of course, thatâ€™s my opinion and you can â€œfire meâ€ or whatever. I suppose I couldnâ€™t keep my pen shut this time. Peace.”

Peace to you, too, Alan. I was just talking to my husband today about lack of Catholic priests and the things that could be leading to that. I have my ideas how some of that could be resolved, but I don’t know that I will see those things put in place in my lifetime.

I was having a “fantasy,” of sorts, about what will happen as there are less Catholic priests. So here is what will happen: if you are Catholic, you get your hand scanned by some kind of electronic do-hickey and then you go to a building (doesn’t need to be a church) and stick your hand over the do-hickey which scans your hand. When it recognizes you as one of the Catholics, out pops a consecrated Host! Ta-da!

Or…you sign up to have the consecrated Hosts mailed to you. If one gets delivered to someone else by mistake, well, hey, maybe they will read what this is all about and become Christian or Catholics themselves. Evangelism by mail and failed delivery. Wow! Or, if if the Host was delivered to the wrong address, there could be a note inside telling the receiver where to drop the envelope with the Host in a safe place or how to mail it back to the original sender.

(Please know that all of the above is done “tongue in cheek.”)

I started thinking crazy things like this because I remember one commenter here some time ago saying he doesn’t really care if the priest give good homilies (sermons) or not because he goes to Mass for the Eucharist. I am not making fun of what he said, because I actually can agree with what he said. It does make it sound like the Eucharist is kind of like a “God pill,” but you know, the more I thought about it being like a “God pill” the more I actually liked the thought. I don’t know about you, but I need all the God pills I can get. I know, I know….that is not the only way we become sanctified. We still need prayer, confession, loving our neighbors, and more. We need it ALL.

As Michael keeps telling us, the truth is that we need each other to help us grow in love. As our local church structures change, how we “do” church will change and only God knows how that will look in a hundred years.

OK….returning to my “serious” self now.

By: Paul Wilkinson

Paul Wilkinson — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 02:39:22 +0000

Interesting that you post this now, as I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about the general concept of “planting.”

Historically, Christians have planted missions, they’ve planted schools, they’ve planted hospitals, they’ve planted seniors’ homes, they’ve planted Christian camps, and also, they’ve planted churches.

But that spirit doesn’t seem to be as strong today in areas other than church planting, which as you point out, is a variable agenda depending on the ecclesiology of the group concerned. In the part of the world were I live, the province of Ontario, it’s been more than 30 years since anyone started a Christian camp from scratch. We have churches that are missional, and we’ve rediscovered the poor, but haven’t seen the type of inner city missions that characterized Christian witness 100 years ago. The parish nurse concept has raised the profile of health care, but we see nothing compared to the building of hospitals in the past. The only creative energies in the Christian education sector are being spent on recruiting students.

So I would say that this is more about the lack of the entrepreneurial spirit; brought about by the lack of empowerment of the laity. We tend to leave these matters to “the pros,” and right now, they’re all busy.

By: JB

JB — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 19:35:20 +0000

As others above have pointed out, the worlwide reality is that high church groups also have been spreading, particularly in non-Western countries. I think there’s a perception in the US that low church groups are more into church planting because US low church groups tend to be more consumer and marketing oriented…more of a man-centered theology which emphasizes getting the most people possible to just pray that one prayer of salvation and be saved. This means having worship styles which use secular music to attract people into the church, emphasizing emotional, high pressure altar calls and getting a Christian message, even if watered down, out there as urgently as possible (often the urgency is because of a belief that Christians are going to be “raptured” away at any moment). High church groups tend to have a more long term view at building the Kingdom and promote a more rational approach to Christianity, with emphasis on continuity of heritage and a more “thought out” conversion process. There is less urgency to blanket the world with a watered down message and more emphasis on getting out the full message in a slow, reasoned way.

By: Mike McConville

Mike McConville — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 19:23:43 +0000

I haven’t read the other comments so I may be repeating what someone has already said—-but in light of your mention of Wesley in a recent thread, I would say that this has always been a problem. What provoked the Wesleyan revival in England was Wesley’s desire to take the gospel to the masses instead of expecting them to travel to “four consecrated walls.” The resistence he faced from the Anglicanism of his day was huge. I think due to the fact that well established denominations that have been around a long time tend to rest on their laurels, content with where they are and what they have.

By: Patrick Lynch

Patrick Lynch — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 16:19:20 +0000

We need to plant more churches.

The fact is, there hasn’t been much space in the diocesan system for the leadership contributions of enthusiastic and educated “full-time” believers, and I think its shaped Catholic culture towards being too comfortable with the status quo.