Monthly Archives: April 2008

The New Conspirators – Tuesday Book Review

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The New Conspirators : Creating the Future one Mustard Seed at a Time by Tom Sine

“In spite the fact that our world is changing at blinding speed and the church is going through some very tough times, God is still at work in ways that aren’t always immediately apparent. For some reason, God seems to delight in conspiring through the small, insignificant and ordinary to renew the church and transform the world.”

This book was long due. Tom Sine spent 3+ years collecting stories, interviewing people, bugging friends and collecting the data that end up in this fantastic book.

You might have heard authors talk about books taking a life of their own, and that is true of this one. As a friend of Tom I was fortunate enough to be around while the book was taking shape. Originally it was meant to be a reincarnation of a his book The Mustard Seed Conspiracy, published in the mid-80′s. But that would not hold up to the amazing stories of creativity and faith that Tom was listening. Tom later decided that this was meant to be an entire different book about the God’s new conspirators in the here and now.

While many of the current books in the Christian circles cover one topic – Tom have ventured to explore what he calls in the book the 4 streams of renewal for the church and the world: The Emerging Church, The Missional Church, New Monasticism and The Mosaic (Multi-Cultural) Church. Lots had and is written about the Emerging Church and Missional church. New Monasticism is a hot topic these days. So I am glad Tom included what the multi-cultural church is doing as a fresh and challenging expression in contemporary Christianity.

In this book Tom engage us in five conversations:

  • Taking the New Conspirators Seriously
  • Taking the Culture Seriously
  • Taking the Future of God Seriously
  • Taking the Turbulent Times Seriously
  • Taking our Imaginations Seriously

I think it is very important to point out that this is a book on a global expression of the new conspirators. The stories and examples does not come from the western hemisphere alone. This is not an American book. Though the book you’ll read stories of ordinary people confronting the powers and living out God’s Kingdom values in Africa, UK, Latin America, Australia, USA and all over the world.

The New Conspirators is a primer in the global conversation on how God is creating the future one mustard seed at a time. You can read the introduction of the book at www.thenewconspirators.com.

A must read definitely.

Brian McLaren connects Anabaptist and Emergent movements

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While I think the title of this article is a little misleading, Submergents have been conspiring this connection for awhile now, is still a very insighful read.  In a recent conversartion with Brian while he was in Seattle, he showed a lot on enthusiasm and interest for Submergent, of which I am part even though I am not denominationally an anabaptist.

 Author connects Anabaptist and Emergent movements


A group of Anabaptists and Emergent leaders have formed a network called Submergent to share ideas. Congregations in several U.S. cities, as well as Perth, Australia, are calling themselves Submerged Communities.

“In many ways Emergent represents a rediscovery of the Anabaptist spirit,” he said. “It’s very hard in other Protestant denominations to find people who take Jesus as teacher deeply seriously, and take Jesus’ teachings and the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus’ example of nonviolence seriously.”

As Emergent and Submergent Christians seek new ways to be church, they often exist outside of denominational structures.

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God Loves Sex Workers and Doesn’t Require Them to Repent

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Here is an interview with my friend Bowie Snodgrass from NYC.

village voice sex naked city – God Loves Sex Workers and Doesn’t Require Them to Repent

Bowie Snodgrass and her colleague Isaac Everett are the founders of Transmission, an emerging liturgical community in New York City that meets every other week in its members’ homes. Participants gather to eat a vegetarian meal, socialize, and participate in a ritual that is created collaboratively by the group. Though they identify as Christian, there is no specific dogma; Transmission believes that by creating a ritual participants create community, and by being part of it they become part of the community.

It was with this foundation that eight members of Transmission, along with an equal number of sex workers and local artists, conceived of the idea of Easter at Avalon, a service that explored the Mary Magdelene story and was an open forum for sex workers and their allies. The event took place on Easter Sunday 2007 at Club Avalon, famous as both the former Limelight club and as a church founded by William Augustus Muhlenberg, whose radical ministry assisted brothel workers and abandoned mistresses in forging new paths. Bowie believes that sex workers should be wholly welcomed into houses of worship and not shamed, not least of all because, “We’re in NYC and this is the twenty-first century, so let’s push this conversation as far as we can.” She urges that in order for religious groups to stay in tune with people, “We really need talk about and acknowledge the fact that people have complicated lives.”

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Trinity Church Wall Street Consultation

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Early this month (March 30 – April 2) I was part of a consultation on the spirituality of young adults hosted by Trinity Church Wall Street.

The gathering featured Alt. Worship pioneer Jonny Baker. He is a sort of a non-official bishop of the emerging church in the UK and beyond. Jonny facilitated part of the conversation about tinkering with spirituality, read about it on his blog. I’ve been following his ministry and creative input since the mid 90′s and it was good to meet him finally. We had very good conversations about the expression of the emerging church in UK, the view of the american version of emerging/emergent (hot topic these days, see Jonny’s comments about the topic on his blog).

The group of around 33 people involve mostly in young adults, student ministry was divided into groups to discuss 3 main topics – Social Justice, Intentional Community and Spiritual Formation. While I was personally interested in the intentional community group, I was asked to participate in the Faith Formation discussion.

These are some of the insights I took with me from that conversation:

Mentorship

  • uncomfortable with the power dynamic inherent in the word
  • it shouldn’t be a question of heirarchy of authority, mentoring is a gift
  • spiritual direction has become too professionalized

Community

  • intentional communities give the space to put into practice what we say we believe, and that is living out the kingdom of God
  • young people have neither nuclear families nor viable village-models, our extended families have become professionalized and that make can make severing our ties with our parents more stark and traumatic.
  • why can’ there be a tertiary order – communities you don’t have to live in but places you can hang out, like catholic workers

Authenticity

  • what is conversion? what is evangelism? it ought to be about finding one’s own faith and seeing the divine in each life but can we do that without tinges of imperialism, colonialism, and triumphalism?
  • if the gospel is going to be truly transformative and liberative it’s got to be connected to the reality of life – we can’t predict what will be on the other side of it.
  • is a strengthened church the inevitable result or just our desired result? Are we serving God or ourselves?
  • we cannot let established organization have the last word – we have to also be working outside the system.
  • evangelizing ought to include our own limitations and understanding, and our limitations in living out the gospel.
  • this intention to convert others contains a certain violence.
  • are we really trying to transform our church, or are we trying to fill our church?

Authority

  • we should be thinking about authority beyond hierarchy
  • we can find the info line but what we need is meaning and relationship
  • young adults respond to age, experience, and wisdom; it’s authority which they distrust.
  • our fears about the blind leading the blind, where does authority actually reside?
  • authority is relational, church is not repository of information and/or truth
  • thinking of leadership this way de-links the notion of church from physical buildings and dioceses

Beside the great conversations, the food at the retreat center was unbelievable – see menu.


Where the Spirit Leads – Latino Pentecostals

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Where the Spirit Leads, Sojourners Magazine/April 2008

Where the Spirit Leads

Pentecostals may be the least known and most unpredictable group on the landscape.
by Aaron McCarroll Gallegos

The enigma of Latino Pentecostals is found in their ability to resist labels and simple classifications. Or maybe it’s just that most people’s assumptions about them are all wrong? Either way, Latino Pentecostals have been ignored, misunderstood, and mislabeled for too long.

The Latino community has functioned almost undercover for many years, hidden for the most part from the eyes of mainstream society. In The Labyrinth of Solitude, writer Octavio Paz calls the “masks” that Mexicans and other Latinos wear in society “a wall that is no less impenetrable for being invisible.” The image of Latinos in mainstream U.S. society is as unfocused as our ability to agree on what we will call them—Latino or Hispanic, Chicano or Boricua. The name we choose for Latinos tells us more about ourselves us than it does about them.

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