In the process, Jones tries to help emerging churches get beyond their critiques (especially of evangelical Protestantism). He hopes this will lead them to a more substantial theological engagement that just might spark some practical changes in the ways we organise our Christian communities.

For those of you wondering, ‘what on earth is ecclesiology?’, the Wikipedia page on the subject offers a fairly concise overview. Its list of ‘issues addressed by ecclesiology’ is especially helpful. Doug Gay’s recent book on the emerging church is also framed in terms of ecclesiology, which he defines as ‘the Church’s practice of critical theological reflection upon its own practice’ (p.xiv).

For his part, Jones argues for greater engagement with ecclesiology for its own sake. But he also sees engaging with ecclesiology as a practical exercise that will enable emerging churches to refine their own practices in line with what some people might call the movement of the Holy Spirit in the post-modern world.

Both Jones and Gay are responding to a wider sense within emerging churches that their developing practices have been worked out by trial and error, or intuition (or, as others might say, listening to the Holy Spirit), rather than by robust theological reflection.

Jones’ book is self-published, and based on his doctoral work at Princeton Theology Seminary. It is left in the format that is common for a doctoral dissertation. Jones explains that he did not revise the dissertation into a format that would be acceptable for a work of popular theology, because this could delay publication for several years and he was keen to get the ideas out there to be debated.

In fact, some of the material in this book/dissertation has already appeared in Jones’ earlier book The New Christians: Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier (Jossey-Bass 2008). Jones observed and interviewed people in eight different emerging congregations and insights from this work are discussed in both books.

Non-academic readers should not be put off by the prospect of reading a doctoral dissertation, because Jones’ writing is still relatively accessible (although the book does include sentences like: ‘what are the merits of transversal rationality for practical theology?’, p. 177 or ‘this research draws on the principles and methods of phenomenological research, which accords with both the Gadamerian hermeneutic and the transversal methodology discussed in chapter one’, p. 51). But it is not essential to read, for example, the methodological sections of the work which would most likely not have made their way into a work of popular theology.

And readers will benefit from the fact that like any good doctoral dissertation, Jones states his argument in a clear and concise nutshell on the very first page:

‘I will argue that the ECM [emerging church movement] is practising a new form of congregationalism – a “relational ecclesiology,” significant because this burgeoning ecclesiology is not only reflective of the social-media-saturated world in which we now live, but also because it resonates strongly with the ecclesiology proposed by Jurgen Moltmann in the late-twentieth century.’

Jones supports this argument with the in-depth research on the eight emerging congregations. He identifies these congregations’ ‘concrete practices’, including descriptions of how these practices differ from the way they are done in other types of churches:

• Communion
• Worship
• Preaching
• Community (often virtual, online community)

And ‘practices of virtue’ including:

• Hospitality
• Theology
• Creating art
• Living out the Priesthood of all believers
• Cultivating sacred spaces

From this, he builds his case for ‘relational ecclesiology,’ writing (p. 121):

“There is a binding characteristic of all the foregoing practices: these are ultimately practices of relationality. That is, each of these practices has grown out of the fact that, in the emerging church movement, relationality is placed at a premium. By “relationality” I mean the experience of lived relations between human beings, and between human beings and God. By arranging the seating in the round and on couches, the leaders of Solomon’s Porch and Journey are placing relationality at a higher premium than capacity, for each church could seat more people if they opted for a more efficient seating structure. By walking up the center aisle and calling on interlocuters by name, Tim Keel is making clear that voices other than his are also important in the sermon. And by committing to practices of hospitality and a generous view towards other theologies, all of these congregations are vaunting inter-human relationships above doctrinal accuracy or denominational identity.”

Jones’ fourth chapter is a fascinating analysis of how Moltmann’s wider body of work resonates with those core practices, including Moltmann’s work on the social trinity, liberation theology, adult baptism, open communion, the relational (rather than missional?) understanding of church, and the sense that we have entered a millennium of the Holy Spirit.

Jones also argues that the emerging church is heavily influenced by the often competing conceptions of church offered by Moltmann and by Stanley Hauerwas, and urges greater debate on the relative merits and insights of these models.

I suspect that as a practitioner and a popular theologian Jones would be most interested in debate around his ‘Pragmatic Suggestions for a Relational Ecclesiology’ (chapter 5), which include greater and more intentional emphasis on (p. 164):

• Sacralising the world and de-sacralising the church
• Developing egalitarian and democratic approaches to church governance (a sort of congregational approach, in which links between Christian communities may be developed by social media)
• Encouraging interreligious and intra-church relations built on the language of trust
• Promoting dialogical patterns of preaching and teaching

I agree with Jones that these areas require more sustained reflection and think that without this, the emerging church movement will not realise its potential as a prophetic voice to the wider Christian church.

And as we’ve learned from Doug Gay, these are also areas that have been of concern in the wider and especially European ecumenical movement – partners with which emerging Christians have had surprisingly little conversation.

The most serious concern I have with Jones’ book is that it is so American-centric. In particular its historical discussion locates the origins of the ECM exclusively within the American context and does not consider global or even European trends (discussed with great skill in Doug Gay’s book).

Given this American-centric approach, it is perhaps ironic that Jones chooses to analyse the work of Moltmann, the European, in more depth than the work of Hauerwas, the American. On the other hand, the ECM is most numerous in the United States and Jones –as an American Christian – should not be criticised too much for catering to his primary audience.

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 Irish School of Ecumenics, where I work, annually produces resources for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. These resources are available online, and include an order of service, homily resources notes by Polish priest Marcin Lisak OP, and alternative hymns.

This is the homily by Marcin Lisak:

‘We will all be changed by the victory of our Lord Jesus Christ’ (1 Cor.15:51-58)

Saint Paul warns us and gives us encouragement simultaneously. Firstly, all people are touched by corruption, whether in a physical way – such as illness and death – or in a spiritual way – such as that caused by the deception of sin. The latter is far more radical and hazardous. Sin is the cause of death and as long as there is but one sin in this world, there will be death.

As Paul says, sin is strengthened by the law, but this does not mean that the law is sinful in itself. However, each of us breaks every God-given law multiple times. And that gives laws a strength to measure human weakness and judge over sinners. On the other hand, there can be a fascination that puts us at risk when we become fixated on the letter rather than the spirit of the law, or on strict formal observance without epikeia (reasonableness which allows for setting aside a rule to achieve a greater good).

Concurrently with the obtuseness of the law and the poisonous power of sin, every human person is saved and will be deeply and finally changed by the triumph of the Messiah who has fulfilled the law, cleansed us from sin and restored us to wholeness of life. With the victory of Jesus Christ, no longer is sin strengthened in the life of a believer. Rather, the grace of the Holy Spirit now carries the faithful across the road of despair into the life in God.

To understand better how promising is the hope given by Paul in his letter, we need to go back again to the warning text: “The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law”. Then wherever there is sin, death can deal a fatal blow, but wherever sin has been paid for, forgiven, and removed death has neither a sting nor does harm. It is sin that is our real enemy. And I would like to call to mind that each and every sin has its social consequences.

I remember as a teenager living in Poland, my country of birth, in the grey and faded world where ordinary people did not trust one other and suffered a lot of pain. That was the time of so called “real communism” or “real socialism”. Making social distrust stronger was an agenda of the government which purposely followed the rule of divide et impera (divide and conquer). There were, of course, some physical attacks inflicted on ordinary people of the time – maltreatment, persecution, violence, martial law. But probably just social exclusion and disorder were the worst – a lack of transparency, a ban on freedom of speech and association can be a sickness far more devastating than physical persecutions or even death.

From that point of view it seems to be clear that social oppression, or we should rather say – social sin – is a real weapon against humanity, and accordingly, in Paul’s words – a sting of death. Avoiding defeatism in social life and working to prevent social mistrust were the most demanding challenges. In the end, the impulse of social solidarity emerged from the Christian calling to rebuild the community and strengthen solidarity with one’s fellow countrymen and women . Thus, determination, activity, creativity and the sense of human subjectivity became the very remedies for the social structures of sin. But the risk of social mistreatment is still not far away. It calls to my mind a warning of Pope John Paul II:

“[...] it is not out of place to speak of “structures of sin,” which. . . are rooted in personal sin and thus always linked to the concrete acts of individuals who introduce these structures, consolidate them, and make them difficult to remove… “Sin” and “structures of sin” are categories which are seldom applied to the situation of the contemporary world. However, one cannot easily gain a profound understanding of the reality that confronts us unless we give a name to the root of the evils which afflict us”. (John Paul II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, 36).

Social structures of sin had devastated the people living under the communist regime in Central and Eastern Europe. But even now, in our different corners of the world, we are not immune. Dangers lurk within the neoliberal economy: social irresponsibility, whether in economic management or money-making without any respect for “human ecology” reproduces other sinful structures. So, it is not only physical persecution and harassment that cause suffering and death. We should remember that sin is the sting of death – sin with all its social consequences.

Fortunately, we are promised that death shall vanish and we are not going to die. We will be changed by the victorious power of the risen Christ Jesus. With the birth, obedience, death, and resurrection of his Son, God made death to be swallowed up forever. St Paul says that death is defeated, but he warns that death still has its power to deceive (Hoses 13.14). Paul’s reference to the “sting” – as of a bee or a venomous snake – is reminiscent of Eden. If we want to realise how flourishing is the victory of Christ we need to distance ourselves from sin today, and work for reconciliation amid so many signs of social disorder, at one with Christ who breaks down the walls between people of different cultures and nations.

Marcin Lisak OP

Gay’s insightful and original treatment of this matter, almost entirely overlooked in the popular and academic literature on the emerging church, is just one reason why this book deserves a wide and careful reading.

Gay is a Lecturer in Practical Theology at the University of Glasgow and a Church of Scotland minister. He has been involved with the development of emerging communities the Late, Late Service and Host, so he writes both as an activist and a scholar, making his theology particularly practical and readable for the non-academic theologians among us.

He describes the book as ‘a provisional attempt to theorize the concept of ‘Emerging Church’, a term which he admits ‘may be … very close to the end … as a useful term for the Church’ (p. xi) He prefers to talk about what he calls ‘the Church: Emerging’ (p. xiii):

I prefer to speak of ‘the Church: Emerging’, as a conscious attempt to re-weight the term towards ecclesiology – the Christian practice of reflecting on the nature and practice of Church.’

I’m not sure that the Church: Emerging is going to catch on – the words just seem clunky to me compared to ‘the emerging church.’

But I can appreciate Gay’s foregrounding of ecclesiology, which he helpfully defines as ‘the Church’s practice of critical theological reflection upon its own practice’ (p.xiv).

And I can understand his exasperation with the ‘debate’ over the emerging church label (he says he is ‘bored … with … the promotion and criticism,’) p. xi. The term also seems to be falling out of favour with some in the movement, as noted in James Bielo’s book Emerging Evangelicals (another on the list to be reviewed on this blog!).

Gay’s treatment of the history of the Church: Emerging, grounded as it is in a UK context, brings something to the table that other studies of the emerging church lack – especially studies which focus on its American expressions.

And what Gay brings is a broader perspective on the context and influences that have contributed to the development of the movement. Like other writers and scholars, Gay correctly sees it as emerging in large part from evangelicalism, or more broadly, Low Church Protestantism (LCP).

In my own research on Ikon, which can be considered a Northern Irish expression of the emerging church, I also have argued that it is emerging from, and therefore critiquing, evangelicalism.

But as I explained in my earlier post, Gay argues that the ecumenical movement also has been significant in this process, helping:

‘to create a context in which low church Protestants … felt freer to critique their own tradition and to experiment with the insights and practices of other Christian traditions.’

Added to this, Gay explores the importance of the charismatic renewal and the liturgical movement, in addition to Vatican II. For him, Vatican II has helped to ease tensions between Catholics and Protestants, again creating a context in which those all-important Low Church Protestants feel more comfortable interacting with the more ancient expressions of the Christian faith.

Gay illustrates this with a Northern Irish-based story on the very first page of the first chapter of the book (‘When Were You Robbed? – Auditing’) about how encounters with the ‘other’ have shaped the Church: Emerging. I can’t resist sharing it (p. 1-2):

… I love the story told by Belfast-based Presbyterian minister and writer Steve Stockman about a cross-community project in which Protestant and Roman Catholic young people visited one another’s places of worship as part of a reconciliation programme of encounter and exchange. The visit to the Roman Catholic chapel having duly taken place, the young people headed off to the Presbyterian church. As they all filed in, one young Catholic boy looked around in surprise and said: ‘When were you robbed?’

… the first stage of emergence was marked by a move I will call ‘auditing’ – a reflexive moment reached within our own development as low church Protestants. As in the Belfast story, this was provoked by experiences and encounters that challenged us to look and listen beyond the limits and boundaries of our own tradition.

Auditing is just one of the five key ‘moves’ that he sees the Church: Emerging undertaking. If I am reading him correctly, Gay interprets these moves as vital to a re-formation of Christian practice and sensibility not all that different from the Reformation (an argument taken up more pointedly in Phyllis Tickle’s The Great Emergence). There is a chapter devoted to each of the five moves, which are:

• Auditing
• Retrieval
• Unbundling
• Supplementing
• Remixing

The chapter on remixing is of course an important one, given that ‘Remixing the Church’ is the title Gay gives his book and it is in this chapter that he ‘ventures a definition’ of the emerging church, which I shared in my earlier post.

What intrigues me about this definition is its emphasis on a DIY-style grassroots ecumenism, which sees the Church: Emerging as ‘… a set of possibilities, which will be performed in very different ways in different locations.’

So ‘Remixing the Church’ means to draw on resources from a rich variety of Christian traditions, in an effort to live more authentically as Christians.

This does not mean that emerging Christians are engaging in syncretism, a watering-down of historic doctrines, or making the church ‘fit’ into a post-modern, relativistic milieu.

As Gay demonstrates expertly in this book, if (as?) the emerging church as we know it disappears, its contribution to global Christianities may be more important than we now think.

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

Rollins’s stiff sounds clever in the academy, but surely the real test is how it washes with the common woman or man. This was the genius of Christ and his ability to communicate with a Doctor of Divinity Nicodemus and an outcast woman in close succession. I don’t think I would be able to represent Rollins accurately to most of my congregation, but then again, I’m not sure I would want to. He may offer some tasty bites to a certain subgroup of disillusioned and cynical cognoscenti, but I don’t see him offering any “real food”- or hope- to the vast majority of hungry souls we deal with every day.

I can see where Monty is coming from on this point, because I’ve heard others say they found it difficult to grasp his ideas. Once, after Rollins had delivered a public lecture where I work – the Irish School of Ecumenics – one of my master’s students said to me:

‘that was great, but I’m not sure I understood what he said!’

Rollins is a charismatic speaker and enthusiastic about his topics, so I think my student’s comment that the talk was ‘great’, was in some way a response to Rollins’ enthusiasm. I also think it was a response to the many thought-provoking gems that Rollins scatters throughout his talks.

But if you are looking for a three-point sermon, or a set of power point slides that delivers an argument in a sequential, step-by-step format, you won’t get it from Rollins.

And if master’s students, who are relatively firmly embedded in the ‘academy,’ have some difficulty with Rollins, what hope for the rest of us?

In his review of Rollins’ talk at the Black Box in Belfast on Sunday evening, blogger Alan in Belfast (his post includes audio of the talk) makes his lack of understanding a major theme of his post:

It’s difficult to summarise Pete’s talk.

Therein lies a problem. No matter how good his critique of the repeating plot structure of Laurel and Hardy is … and no matter how many broad generalisations are thrown in (“we find a way to domesticate any voice that offends us”, “my thesis is that deep down most of us know that most of it [conventional Christian belief] is a bit rubbish”, “when you love someone you experience them as a universe yet to explore”), I can’t follow the thread of his argument from one end of the talk to the other (nor from one end of a book to the other).

[The honourable exception to this rule is Pete’s book of parables –The Orthodox Heretic: And Other Impossible Tales – which are simple and superb.]

To Pete, my inability to comprehend may be failure.* To me, it’s not. Part of my problem is that single lines float out from Pete’s narrative that make my mind scuttle off to think, losing track of what he goes on to argue in the process. (*Unless he just puts it down to my stupidity.)

Alan in Belfast is of course neither a failure nor stupid – he’s one of the more intelligent bloggers on this island on a range of social, political and religious issues. Alan goes on to write that having your own views challenged, and being forced to think in a different way, are some of the main benefits of trying to engage with Rollins’ work.

I’m an academic social scientist, not a philosopher or a theologian, and I also find Rollins’ work challenging – but in a good way. My series of posts over the last month or so has been my attempt to work out my understanding of what Rollins is saying.

I think I can follow the arguments in Rollins books, though they do vary in their accessibility. Not counting Rollins’ book of parables, which is very accessible, I think his latest, Insurrection, is the most accessible, followed by How (Not) to Speak of God and finally, The Fidelity of Betrayal.

But Rollins’ arguments, both in books and in lectures, are delivered in what might be called a post-modern style – through stories and examples and reflections on philosophical or psycho-analytical ideas. This is not the so-called ‘rational’ step-by-step argumentation that many students or people in the pews listening to sermons, have come to expect.

I think there is a reason behind this, and that is that Rollins’ doesn’t think the world works in such a rational, step-by-step way. His more impressionistic, circular, and perhaps roundabout way of making his points reflects that.

I have a hunch that Rollins doesn’t want us to leave a lecture or finish a book thinking that we have understood everything. He wants us to go away and start thinking more for ourselves.

For me the more serious points raised by Monty and by Alan in Belfast are:

For Monty – whether Rollins’ ideas can give people hope:

He may offer some tasty bites to a certain subgroup of disillusioned and cynical cognoscenti, but I don’t see him offering any “real food”- or hope- to the vast majority of hungry souls we deal with every day.

and for Alan – whether Rollins’ neglects the life and example of Jesus:

Strangely, there’s little talk about encountering Jesus. Other than the cross, Jesus life and example doesn’t get much of a mention.

I can only speak for myself when I say that Rollins’ wider body of work has been helpful for me as a Christian. It’s comforting to know that you are not alone in your critiques of the contemporary churches, including their sins and failures. I think it is inherently hopeful to identify the weaknesses of Christian institutions, as that is the first step in addressing them and changing them for the better.

Rollins’ work has also encouraged me to take more personal responsibility for how I live, as he sees this as more important than working out exactly what you believe.

I would link Rollins’ emphasis in his wider work on how to live, to ‘Jesus’ life and example’. Rollins may not have spoken a lot about ‘Jesus’ life and example’ in his recent talk.

But now that I am pushed to think about it, how to live like Jesus – religion-less Christianity, in the Bonheoffer-inspired term Rollins often uses – seems to me to be one of the major themes of Rollins’ work.

Posts in the Series

The Series that Started the Series

What Troubles you about Peter Rollins? Towards an Assessment Part I

What’s Liberating about Peter Rollins? Towards an Assessment Part II

Do you Identify with Peter Rollins? Towards an Assessment Part III

Is Peter Rollins on a Mission? Towards an Assessment Part IV

The Second Series

Is Peter Rollins a Universalist? – Responding to Monty Part I

Peter Rollins and Being ‘In Christ’ – Responding to Monty Part II

Peter Rollins and the Holy Spirit – Responding to Monty Part III

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.