emerging mosaic

One of my favorite writers speakers and evangelicals Tony Campolo has a great article on beliefnet.com calling for a new approach to Christian participation in the political arena. He wants to

jump-start a religious movement that will transcend partisan politics. Believing that Jesus is neither a Republican nor a Democrat, we want to unite Christians who are concerned about what is happening in America.

Having recently met with some political types in our state I was amazed to find out how few political folks thought realized that not all people of faith subscribed to the Pat Robertson view of the world. It seems that conventional wisdom was the Christian faith community all looked at the world the same way had constituency had already been wrapped up by one side of the political debate.

Being a person who doesn’t buy into either of the extremes I’m excited to here someone like Campolo calling for Christian engagement that moves beyond partisan politics. God is not a Republican or Democrat. God is God and to tie God to one political arm or the other seems like political expedience that borders on blasphemy to me. I think Christians that engage in the public square in a way that glorifies God when we take the whole counsel of scripture to heart and we don’t cherry pick one or two issues.

That is what I think Bono (among other unorthodox Christ followers) is doing

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Maurice Broaddus has this to say in an article Black People in the Conversation over at emergent diversity

In a lot of ways, the emergent church struck me as, well, the Christian equivalent of the grunge movement. A little subversive, a little edgy, and whole lot of white, middle class evangelicals trying to make Christianity look cool. In other words, originally I saw a lot of style over substance. However, once I dug a little deeper, read some of the foundational works, a lot of the substance of postmodernism resonated. I was left wondering how this would translate to black churches, wondering what an emergent African American church would look like or what a multi-cultural emergent church would look like. Better put, what would a multi-cultural church look like that drew on all worship traditions? Because, let me tell you, I ain’t feeling guitars, candles, and labyrinths. I love organs, drums, and gospel choirs way too much to give them up. Of course, part of this stems from the fact that we could all stand with a bigger definition of worship.

Mauice raises some important point about how worship can be a point of disconnect for black folks in the emerging church conversation. I’ve run into this at my faith. Some heavily Anglo emerging church times might not want up front preaching (ala Doug Pagitt’s  reimaging preaching) most black folks expect that. So it has been important to search for common ground.

HarvestBoston asks can (or should) emergent be a prophetic national voice? he has this statement attributed to Brian McLaren

But this approach fails to realize how compromised those supposedly Christian roots are—by slavery and racism, for example. What Native American would like to go back to the nineteenth century? What African American would like to go back to the 1950’s? Dr. King used to say that the church must be neither the master of the state nor its servant, but rather its conscience.

If we seek to reinvigorate our churches but fail to be a prophetic voice in our nation, we miss an important opportunity. Or, put another way, if in ten years more of our churches are thriving and growing—but racism is intact and no less entrenched, will we be satisfied?

This is the kind of imperative I hear from some in the emergent conversation that give some hope and why I think practicing reconciliation matters. I wish others would pick on the truth that race matters.

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Apparently some "learned evangelicals" have decided that gravity isn’t gravity. Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity It’s God shoving us down. This is the kind of slippery slope that these folks go down when they push veiled efforts to promote creationism as intelligent design. I happen to believe that intelligent design makes sense. Science is showing that there is greater order to the universe and all things created than was previously thought.

But that is not incompatible with evolution. Why do some of us followers of Jesus seem so obsessed with fitting God’s power, work and creation into our narrow understanding and worldview.

What ever became of  “I am nothing—how could I ever find the answers? I will cover my mouth with my hand. I have said too much already. I have nothing more to say.” Job 40:4-5Job 40:4-5
English: Contemporary English Version (1999) - CEV
4 Who am I to answer you? ⁵ I did speak once or twice, but never again.

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America’s favorite author of vampire tales is now writing about blood of a different sort. Check out this article.

Anne Rice from vampires to Jesus — Beliefnet.com

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In an article on On Evangelicals and Interfaith Cooperation, an interview with Tony Campolo makes this statement that I think is relevant to the spiritual practice of (racial) reconciliation I suggested in my post emergent thread.

TC: Rather than making theological statements, we need to tell each other our stories. Jesus would tell stories and then say, "what do you make of this story?" One more story.

I believe the being of reconciliation of any kind (but especially racial reconciliation) is when we  can safely tell our story.

What’s your story?

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