Patrick Mitchel, Director of Studies and lecturer in theology at the Irish Bible Institute in Dublin and author of Evangelicalism and National Identity in Ulster, 1921-1998 (Oxford University Press 2003), spoke at the launch. Mitchel’s book was influential on me as a wrote this book with Claire, as well as my first book, Evangelicalism and Conflict in Northern Ireland (Palgrave 2008). Mitchel also maintains a lively blog called Faith in Ireland. So it was an honour that he accepted our invitation to speak at the launch. Below are excerpts of Mitchel’s reflections on our book.

Patrick Mitchel on Evangelical Journeys

Evangelical Christians often get a bad rap  … sometimes rightly, and often not. If in Northern Ireland evangelicals are often associated with social and political conservatism, in this part of the world (the Republic of Ireland), they are less known and more often equated with fundamentalism or the political ambitions of the American Right. But the stereotypes tend to reduce down what is a lively, complex, theologically diverse, adaptable, and changing tradition … to a purely political analysis.

So I found this book refreshing for at least three reasons:

1. Transparency

There was no hiding behind the safe boundaries of the supposedly omniscient sociologist – who can decode everyone’s true motives but who remains pure and objective, above the fray in a pristine world of detached observation!

Claire and Gladys are transparent in telling of their own positions and journeys – we can be grateful here for the postmodern importance of the authors’ own perspectives – and the book is all the stronger for this.

And in this respect the methods chapter is a model of transparency – the aims and conclusions are realistic and solid.

2. Understanding and Respect

I teach a course on evangelicalism within our MA – and trying to keep up with the endless flow of books, debates, and movements, is quite a job. What I liked about Claire and Gladys’ approach is that, well aware of the spectrum of evangelical identity and praxis across denominations, they are not reductionistic but keenly aware of the need for nuance and understanding.

And not only understanding … this book represents a mammoth amount of time – in interviewing 95 people, transcribing and analysis – in building relationships. 

The actual breakdown into the various categories is not surprising – the spectrums within evangelicalism have been well sketched – by Gladys in her first book, Glenn Jordan, my book – and many other broader studies outside Ireland …

But the authors’ overall approach here is very helpful – they don’t get into the myriad debates of evangelical self-understanding and definitions. For how you understand evangelicalism will to a significant degree depend on what criteria you are using to define it. There are many approaches to definition:

• historical – 18^th century onwards – inherently Protestant
• theological: – a belief in certain doctrines
• experiential – a particular religious experience of personal faith cradled in a theology (Grenz)
• narrow spiritual – where being a Christian = being an evangelical
• sociological – like this book

In a sociological approach, the focus is not on who is or is not a ‘true’ evangelical, or whether some expressions of faith here are compatible with Scripture or historic orthodoxy, or even if they are self-consistent. There is a suspension of judgement in this sense.

Now for someone like me who loves theology, at times such suspension of critical theological evaluation of what people are saying makes me want at times to say:

‘BUT … what about?’ There were quite a few places in this book where that happened!

But that’s OK – no book can do everything. And the great strength of this one is the achievement of Gladys and Claire drawing out people’s stories in a non-judgemental framework. I don’t know if you agree – but even within families it is darn hard to talk about a private thing like personal faith. They have done remarkably in getting people to talk so openly. They have described those stories without trying to prove their own agendas. They have respected those stories and the people telling them and are to be congratulated on the fascinating pictures that emerge.

3. Insights

And that understanding leads to a genuinely useful and constructive contribution into the nature of evangelical Christianity within the culture of Northern Ireland. These are some things that stood out to me – and there are many others:

i. Re-emphasised – the essential place of conversion –and personal faith. The fact that pretty well all interviewees had this experience is a good indicator of evangelicalism – whether you are Prod, Roman Catholic, agnostic, atheist, etc – everyone needs to have a spiritual new start through faith in Christ and the Spirit of God. But what is helpful here is the complexity and messiness of conversion – and how far more is involved than abstract rational ideas.

ii. The importance of personal choice is rightly stressed. The dark side of course here is individualism – and ‘me-centred’ theology – and a lack of theology of church and sacraments. This is both the strength and weakness of evangelicalism.

iii. The importance of context – especially for the conservative becoming more conservative/fundamentalist – is tied up with the political context. This is where as an evangelical in the Republic, how different a shape and ethos it has to the alien North becomes obvious: in the Republic many evangelicals are former Catholics and Irish in culture. An interesting area of future research would be differences between evangelicalism north and south, emphasising how evangelicalism is not just some pure abstract set of doctrines – but has ‘many faces’ globally.

iv. The importance of openness, theological discussion (especially with other traditions like Catholicism) and engaging the mind: the church at a local level needs to be a place of questions and discussion. The perennial issue of evangelical spirituality lies close to the surface of many of these stories  – and the question of how can spirituality flourish or not within the church? And linked here is the importance of further study and travel. As someone who teaches at an evangelical third level college  the repeated thing  I hear is that students absolutely love the study – of new ideas – perhaps not something there is space or time for at the local church?

So to sum up – congratulations on not only an interesting and easy to read book – but one that I think adds to the understanding of a diverse strand of Christianity in Northern Ireland – and poses some constructive challenges to that community.

Further reviews of Evangelical Journeys:

The Belfast launch of the book took place in November at East Belfast Mission and featured remarks by Glenn Jordan.

You can purchase the book at the UCD Press website, where you can get it at a reduced rate of €22.

Read a review of the book, by Blogger Alan in Belfast, here.

Read a review of the book, by  George Irwin in the Church of Ireland Gazette, here.

Newell joked that he has been coming to Clonard longer than many of the Catholics who were attending the service, pointing out that he first came to Clonard in 1981.

Newell’s long-standing relationships with people at Clonard, and his impeccable, lived-out commitment to ecumenism over the years, enabled him to deliver a powerful message on the theme ‘What Does Communion Mean?’

You can watch a video of the Gospel reading, and Newell’s sermon, here. The Gospel relates the story of Jesus’ calling of the first disciples, fishermen who quickly left what they were doing to follow Jesus.

Newell reflects on that passage, emphasising that the fishermen brothers from Capernaum – Peter and Andrew; and James and John – had to leave prosperous and promising careers for Jesus’ sake. Then, they had to learn to get along with, and love, the once-hated tax collector Matthew. The following are excerpts from Newell’s sermon.

Ken Newell on ‘What Does Communion Mean?’

Jesus began to show them [Peter, Andrew, James and John] that they were all brothers, and even in the most unlikely people [Matthew] there are hidden treasures that Jesus can unlock.

… Jesus was teaching them about communion, with each other and with him. That the hands that must reach out to receive the body of Christ in the Eucharist are taken by Jesus … and expanded to reach out to the body of Christ in the other churches.

Now if there is a spiritual exercise I want you to take home that is revolutionary and life changing, here it is: when you reach out your hands in the Eucharist to take the body of Christ and draw it into yourself, automatically your hands will be stretched out to reach out to his body in all the other Christian churches. That’s the deal of the gospel, and that’s the story of the Christian faith.

… Peter discovered on the beach that day that the parochial spirit … was expanded by Jesus … Jesus [expanded Peter’s parochial spirit] … as wide as the new emerging universal church.

To be catholic is go be universal. … The heart of being catholic means the development and the expansion from the parochial to a universal heart. .. For Peter to be expanded he had to let something go …

If you don’t feel your Christian spirit to be expanding and to be reaching out to those of other Christian traditions in this city and in this country, I’m asking you is there something you need to let go to let Jesus expand your spirit?’

• Could it be fear? If I go there I’ll feel out of place and uncomfortable?
• … Could it be a hidden hurt, something was done to you in … your life? That someone from the other community put you down? And if they did can I apologise? From the bottom of my heart, for all the hurt and pain that my community has inflicted on yours, and on your church. … Is there a hurt there that you need to let go of?
• … Or is there in a back of your mind … a sense of pride … [that] I belong to a great big church, I’m not interested in these minnows? Well I’ll tell you something, Jesus is. Is there a pride that stops you connecting?
• … Or is there a feeling of indifference? … Why would I be interested in going to any other church or meeting any other people?

Jesus is not indifferent to our divisions and that’s why he prays for our unity.

I end with this radical truth at the very heart of our faith:

If tonight, you get down on your knees at your bedside and you say, our Father, who art in heaven; and if I get down by my bedside and pray to our Father in heaven, that means that we have one Father. Whatever church we come from.

Here’s the radical thing. If he’s our Father, what does that make us to each other? We are brothers and sisters. We are blood brothers and blood sisters through the cross. And when we make the sign of the cross we take up a lifestyle that is prepared to move out of a parish mentality and cross all the divisions that have separated Christians in this country for centuries.

We’re here to restore the family and bring it together again. We are here to win that battle. And friends, can I say to you, we’re not playing for a draw. And neither is the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Because communion means connecting.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

The event will take place on Thursday 26 January at 4.15 pm at the Irish School of Ecumenics, Bea House, Milltown Park, Dublin.

This event comes at the end of the annual Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (18-25 January).

I am really looking forward to what Patrick Mitchel has to say about the book. He also maintains his own thoughtful and informative blog called ‘Faith in Ireland.’

Evangelical Journeys will be available at a special launch price of 20 euros.

You can download a flyer for the Dublin event here.

The Belfast launch of the book took place in November at East Belfast Mission and featured remarks by Glenn Jordan.

You also can purchase the book at the UCD Press website, where you can get it at a reduced rate of €22.

Read a review of the book, by Blogger Alan in Belfast, here.

Read a review of the book, by  George Irwin in the Church of Ireland Gazette, here.

Please RSVP to Gladys Ganiel by 23 January on gganiel@tcd.ie

I recommend you read the full post for yourselves. It covers a lot of ground, from Fischer’s description of the Conflict Transformation module to her thoughts on the hell debate sparked by Rob Bell’s Love Wins.

The Conflict Transformation module features an intensive week at Corrymeela, where Little and Verwoerd guide the students through the process they use with various groups from opposing ‘sides’ in the conflict in and about Northern Ireland (and from other conflicts from around the world).

Fischer sees conflict as an inevitable part of life and she urges those in the emergent conversation to face up to – rather than hide from – it:

I bring this up here, because I see the danger of continuing a bad ‘family’ trait even into this new emergent generation.  I grew up in a non-christian home and a Christian extended family, both of which pretended that if we didn’t talk about conflict, it meant that we didn’t have any;  I studied theology at an inter-denominational college where conflict as a theme in and of itself was never addressed theologically; and I spent years in churches, seminars, conferences, retreats and missions (Evangelical, Charismatic, and Lutheran; in America, Sweden, Australia, PNG and Germany), where, besides an occasional reference to Matthew 18:15-17, and the ever-present lapel to forgive, there was no strategy and no underlying concept for helping their communities deal with conflict constructively.  The cardinal assumption being that good Christians don’t do conflict!

But rather than fostering fraternities exuding peace and justice in the world, this refusal to take conflict head on theologically, exacerbates the friction inevitable in any human plural, and conditions cultures to fester and fracture over matters both profound and piddling.  Of greater consequence even than the personal stories of disillusionment with Christian fellowships that abound, as grim as that is, however, is the general disconnect that many faith communities and institutions have toward complex societal ills, the prolific number of armed conflicts around the world, and trans-global injustices.  With the exception of my brief time in Church of the Savior, DC, of which Sojourners Magazine is a part, nary a mention of these realities in the Christian sub-cultures I’ve experienced in over twenty years!

She sees some of the present debate about hell, whether you agree with Rob Bell or not, as distracting from more important questions in the here and now such as dealing with conflict, and one of its roots, poverty.

As a lecturer, I’m of course pleased to see Fischer making links between one of our modules and debates in the emerging church. The emerging church is one of my current research areas and I’m always looking for connections between what I know from the fields of conflict resolution and reconciliation, and my work on the emerging church.

I’m also intrigued by her observation that Christians have refused to take conflict on theologically, other than issuing some rather glib urgings for victims to ‘forgive’.

This is not a million miles from the argument put forward in the new book about the churches in the Northern Ireland peace process by John Brewer, Gareth Higgins and Francis Teeney: that the churches as institutions didn’t adequately analyse the conflict sociologically or theologically – meaning that they struggled to help transform it.

I look forward to the emerging conversation moving forward on these themes.

This is the Review:

This book is the fruit of very extensive research and analysis and explores a wide variety of backgrounds and faith journeys.

As an academic study, it is remarkably free of jargon and enables the general readers to gain a deeper understanding of how individuals experience their religion over time and of the factors and circumstances which influence expressions of faith.

The authors demonstrate that evangelicals in Northern Ireland are a very diverse group and that the stereotypes which surface from time to time in public debate are far from representative of evangelicalism.

A very important aim of this book is to explore the everyday life of evangelicals and how they are coping with the rapid pace of change in post-conflict Northern Ireland.

They affirm the conclusions of other published sociological studies with regard to the role of religion in providing a sense of identity in uncertain political circumstances and how this can lead to the deepening of division. However, this study shows that there is a wide variety of ways in which evangelicals engage with politics and social and ethical issues. It is a very complex picture.

Thanks to extensive qualitative research – mostly through in-depth interviews – the authors have been able to gain valuable insights into why and how religious beliefs change over time and to identify the factors which impact most significantly on people’s faith journeys.

The fieldwork carried out by Mitchell and Ganiel reveals an important link between political and religious change, but what distinguishes this study from so many carried out during the past generation is that it deals with the changing pattern of religious belief in a post-conflict situation.

This is a well-written book with extensive notes, bibliography and index sections. It will serve as a valuable textbook for those wishing to carry out further research in the complex subject of religion in Northern Ireland.

(George Irwin, Church of Ireland Gazette, 30 September 2011)

The best place to purchase the book is on the UCD Press website, for a reduced price of €22.

Other Resources:

Book Launch at East Belfast Mission (including remarks by Glenn Jordan)

Book Review by Alan in Belfast on Slugger O’Toole

Interview on Sunday Sequence (BBC Radio Ulster)

This is my final post on the book, intended as a general review of the book. It’s my hope that the review will prompt others to revisit – or to consider for the first time – some of Hurley’s ideas. I’d encourage people to try and get their hands on a copy of the book and read it for themselves.

I work at the Irish School of Ecumenics, and I am often greeted with a blank stare when I tell people where I work. I know that it can’t be taken for granted that people actually know what Ecumenics is. So, it’s helpful that significant chapters in the book are taken up with definitions, which I have explored in earlier posts on this blog:

Fr Michael Hurley on Ecumenical Tithing

Fr Michael Hurley on Ecumenical Theology and Ecumenics

Fr Michael Hurley on Ecumenism

Although published more than a decade ago, the concern that motivated Hurley to write the book is strikingly contemporary – the sense that the ecumenical movement is in the doldrums.

The words Hurley writes in the introduction (p. 1) could have been written today:

‘But despite some remarkable success … ecumenical efforts have not only failed to achieve their goal but the whole movement has, it would seem, failed to maintain its momentum. It has lost its drive, its nerve, its sense of direction. It is now like a ship becalmed needing the mighty wind of the Spirit to get under way again.’

Indeed, last year I reflected on a 2008 article in Doctrine and Life by my Irish School of Ecumenics colleague Andrew Pierce, in which he argued that ecumenism in Ireland remained uninspired and uninspiring.

There are also several chapters that bemoan the shortcomings in the Irish churches’ contributions to peace on this island, and aspects of these read as if they could be written today.

A chapter called ‘The Church of Ireland: Challenges for the Future’ considers the difficulties posed by its relationship with the Orange Order, difficulties that have not yet gone away. Other chapters deal with the challenges of churches caught up in Ireland’s sectarian system can meaningfully promote. forgiveness and reconciliation.

Given this diagnosis, much of the rest of the book could be understood as Hurley’s plea to get people excited about ecumenism and, in the Irish context, reconciliation. This is done through an eclectic mix of chapters, organised into three sections:

Ecumenical Vision

Ecumenical Issues

Ecumenical Initiatives

The section on ecumenical initiatives offers fascinating insights into the history of the churches in Ireland. Chapter topics ranged from the Milltown Park Public Lecture Series 1960-1969, the publication of the book Irish Anglicanism 1869-1969, and the formation of the Irish School of Ecumenics and the now-defunct Columbanus Community of Reconciliation (which was housed in the building now occupied by the Belfast campus of the Irish School of Ecumenics).

Reading the chapters on the Milltown Park Lectures and Irish Anglicanism was like stepping back in time. The socio-religious world Hurley described seems alien in contrast to the Ireland of today.

Can you imagine a church service to celebrate the launch of a book on Anglicanism being broadcast live during prime time on RTE today? Or can you imagine 700 people turning up at Milltown Park on a winter’s evening to hear talks on ‘drugs, brainwashing and the self’ and ‘psychiatry, the moralist and sin’, both delivered by Catholic priests (p. 243)?

Hurley also writes that Eamon DeValera attended several of the Milltown Park lectures, which made me wonder to what extent this founding father of the Irish state realised that the Ireland that he ‘dreamed of’ was fading away?

The historical chapters also provided some perspective on the challenges faced by ecumenists of that generation. While the challenges for Christians committed to Christian unity today might be different, the qualities of patience and perseverance needed then are also surely needed now.

In the other sections, Hurley considers themes of both general ecumenical interest, and others specific to the Irish context. He offers suggestions on how to make baptism and Eucharist more ecumenically meaningful. But again, today, it seems that the practice of both remain as divided as ever in our churches.

Other chapters are Hurley’s own reflections on how the wider church can honour the contributions of Christians of other traditions. So as a Catholic, he praises the insights of Presbyterian John Calvin (in a chapter called ‘Catholicity: The Witness of Calvin’s Institutes’), Methodist John Wesley (in a chapter called ‘Wesley Today and Evangelisation Today’), and Anglican George Otto Simms (in a chapter called ‘George Otto Simms: Ecumenical Examplar 1910-1991’).

I think these reflections can be understood as part of Hurley’s own process of ecumenical formation – really delving into the thought and the spiritual life of Christians of other traditions, and finding there real insight and common ground.