I am encouraged and frustrated and disappointed and perplexed by what I see happening within the growing and emerging expression of the Christian faith in the U.S., particularly within the Emergent Church conversation and beyond and the lost opportunities by The Episcopal Church – the Anglican expression in the U.S.
The post-American-Evangelical and post-Liberal-Mainline experience is beyond the politicized Religious-Right, beyond Borg, Spong, and liberation-theology, beyond the “Seeker-Church” movement, beyond the Baby-Boomer necessity to cast down all that came before them, beyond the 1960’s generational demand of feminism, political-correctness, queerism, identity-politics, yadda, yadda, yadda. It is more than simply reaction to the generation before them. It is a restoration. Thank God, thank God, thank God Almighty!
Finally, the newer generational distinctives are coming back around to re-discovering the baby that was thrown out with the proverbial bathwater.
Yet, why are we who have had these things of liturgy, beauty in worship, sacramental theology, monasticism, the Daily Offices of the fixed-hour prayer missing it? So much energy of this new expression of the Faith takes up the task of re-inventing what has been (is?) the best of us – why must we re-invent the wheel to make the journey?
Why? Because we have forgotten our heritage! Why? Because too many of us have lost the relational aspect of God and the transformational aim of the Gospel! Why? Because we have been deluded by the psychotheraputic cult of self-esteem! There are so many other reasons.
We have in many places repudiated our ancient and marvelous traditions. I am so encouraged that younger people are re-discovering all of this, but the very Church that has exhibited and lived into all this stuff is in the process of repudiating it all in the name of innovation and God only knows why else. Is innovation or change wrong? Absolutely not, but if it is done to force an agenda upon people and the Church, then it is wrong, particularly if the change being perpetuated is not that which speaks to the needs of the future of the Church! Oh, and the prophetic work of the Holy Spirit is not those actions or intentions coming forth from us that conveniently support our agendas.
My rant is over. I hope to be more coherent and complete in the future.

The organist and choirmaster of St. Paul’s commented the other day about how so few churches these days give consideration to the aesthetic – beauty and solemnity in the worship service, the mass. The comment and conversation prior to the comment dealt with the rumor that the next U.S. Book of Common Prayer might leave out all Rite I liturgies, gone would be their theological significance and particularly the older and more Elizabethan-style language.
This, frankly, would be a tragic mistake sense younger generations, generally, are attracted to and prefer the older, Elizabethan-style language (thee’s and thou’s, etc). I’ve experience this dynamic over and over again. To them, this is the language of the Church – that which is tried and true, ancient, not swayed by whim and trend. In like manner, so many young people are attracted to traditional Church architecture rather than the striped-down “seeker church” model. The tragedy would be that those in control would push through their agenda of change despite what demographic information is telling us about those who are making up the future of the Church.
It is about the esthetic present in worship. It is about creating a place and a space in time where the beautiful is presented and experienced. It is one of the primary emphases of The Oxford Movement. The beautiful can be experienced in high or low ritual, and both can be a distraction.
God is worthy of our best efforts. All that we do we shall do as if unto the Lord. The worship of God should be an experience of the beautiful in music, in vestments, in architecture, in language, in art, in manual acts, in our attention and devotion. When during the Eucharist all time is merged into one – the Church Victorious, the Church Militant, the Church Eminent – we are caught up into the experience of Heaven and present with the Great Cloud of Witness. We are in the presence of God Almighty.
How else can we respond? What else is there to do but to give up to God our best?

From an article on Christianity Today’s website covering the recent survey of evangelical ministries about what is in store for the future of Christianity. I presume in the U.S.
Here is a quote:

Mark Dever, pastor at Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, D.C., believes a pluralistic culture will turn increasingly intolerant of Christian faith.

I would counter that the pluralistic culture, in general, has become intolerant of intolerant Christians! While some people are intolerant of religion all together, they make up a very small percentage of the population.

I was reading a review of Andrew Sullivan’s new book, The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back by Mark Gauvreau Judge of Christianity Today.
He doesn’t think much of the book, primarily it seems because Sullivan writes that we are bound by our culture, time, and place and because of this and other reasons we cannot know for sure. Sullivan separates “conservatism” from “fundamentalism.” Fundamentalists, it seems, say that “we know!” From the review, it seems Sullivan claims that true conservatives are willing to say “we are not sure” or “we do not know.” I haven’t read the book, so I am relying on Judge’s review of the book.
Here’s the thing: there are large swaths of the Church that feel that they must say “we know!” They do not separate empirically confirmed knowledge from belief or faith. Our Christian life is based on what? Fact or Faith? It is based on faith because it is not empirically provable. It is metaphysics, not physics. Scripture says in I Corinthians 13:12

“Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”

There are those who convince themselves that what they believe is absolute and without question – making what is held by faith into something of fact. They must deny the truth in order to believe the Truth. I can say with all expectation that I am saved through Jesus Christ, but what proves it? Nothing empirically – it is only by faith that it is realized within me. Ephesians 2:8-9 says:

”For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Well then, of course, anyone who does not agree with the “facts” is apostate and cannot know God. Yet, Scripture tells us that we will not fully (exactly) know what is the Truth of God until we see Him face-to-face.
This isn’t relativism as it has been known. It is humility. It is humility in the sense that we do not think that in this time and in this place and in this culture that we have all knowledge, all that is necessary to know, or that we are now for the first time capable to knowing all things. It simply is not the case, and to claim otherwise is contrary to reason, tradition, and Scripture. Paul wrote, “I know that I know that I know….” We can claim the same and it is true to us, but the assertion is based on faith.
So, if Sullivan will not confirm to this swath of the Church that there are certain things we must know absolutely and without question and can know as “fact,” then he is (we are) what?, a relativist, an agnostic, a person believing contrary to the Truth of God. If Judge is accurate concerning what Sullivan honestly believes, and if Judge demands that Sullivan is in grave error if he says, “I’m not sure,” then perhaps Judge is a fundamentalist after all, and not a true conservative.
It is hard to truly move within an intrinsic sense of humility – I do not know everything and I could be wrong. It is God-given as we yield ourselves to formation in God’s ways. Oh, that we are able to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God.