2037 New Congregations: New Definitions of Christianity
In an update on the Magi Network Friday, the Rev. Ron Robinson
of Epiphany Church of Owasso, Oklahoma, introduced “Ancient/Future”
as a way to “embody an ancient faith in a new way for
a new and emerging world.”
The Magi Network is an independent affiliate of the UUA whose
mission is to help start new UU Christian-oriented churches
around the country. Robinson described himself as “a
church planter,” having started a UU church in Tahlequah,
OK, and now helping Epiphany in gathering its core group,
renting space and planning for a launch date of Easter, 2004.
Epiphany’s web site is www.EpiphanySpirit.org.
“Why church planting?” Robinson asked. “From
1870 to 1906, Unitarians and Universalists started on average
12 new churches per year. We’re at six to eight now.
In 1906, Unitarians and Universalists were .16 percent of
the population. In 2000 we were .078, nearly a one-half decrease.
So there is some correlation between new churches and overall
growth.
“I feel impelled to share my faith in a ‘great
commission’ and the greatest commandment of Jesus in
Matthew chapter 28 to ‘make disciples’ in communities
that love God and love thy neighbor,” said Robinson.
Panelist Derek Parker (“one course short of divinity
degree”) described his odyssey from a Lutheran childhood
to UU Christian. He went to the University of Chicago, where
he started attending a UU church, but sharing time with a
Quaker Meeting. Later, while studying to be a geologist, he
had “a big turning point and left graduate school,”
he said. “I’d wanted to be a scientist since I
was a child. At 24 I felt like I was going through a divorce.”
“What do you do when you feel defeated?” Parker
asked, in describing the insufficiency of his mainstream UU
experience at that difficult time. He returned home and discovered
Epiphany Community Church in Fenton, Michigan. “It brought
my childhood Christianity together with my Unitarian Universalism.”
Asked whether he’d considered leaving for the United
Church of Christ (UCC), Parker said he was tempted but didn’t
for three reasons. “I’m not a Trinitarian and
they are. I’m a Universalist, but Universalism is not
central to their identity. And third, how we deal with other
faiths is different in my experience. I think it’s important
to value the integrity of different religions, with respect
for the depths and differences among them--not to try to meld
them.”
Rev. Peter C. Boullata, the new called minister at Epiphany
in Fenton, grew up in a pluralistic, humanistic UU church
but yearned “for more.”
“I found it in God and Jesus Christ. I believe there
is a Christianity for the 21st century. Isn’t there
a way to be Christian without all the baggage? That seems
to me to be UU Christianity.”
Robinson said that the process of church planting allows
for useful conversation about the word “Christian,”
and about the purpose of churches. “‘Christian’
means reformative, transformative, salvific. We find people
drawn to us who don’t identify as Christians. Where
do you identify, with Jesus as a moral teacher, in building
the community that embodies Christ, in the experience of liberating,
healing?
“What’s the nature of these new communities that
are building around a new, broader view of Christ?”
Robinson asked. “There is a disconnect between the experience
of Christ and churches. There’s so much anxiety around
building a church—size, growth, buildings, budgets.
Now we’re trying to focus on sharing our experience,
on gift-oriented ministries, connecting with passion people
feel, empowering leaders. Then create structures to sustain
the spirit.”
“Another way to put it,” Parker said, “is
churches are serving human need rather than humans serving
the church structure. People come to church looking for ultimacy
and intimacy, to share aspects of biblical stories and the
life and spirit of Jesus. We’re reaching out to people
to say, ‘if you share this dream with me, let’s
get together.’”
The Rev. Carl Scovel, senior minister emeritus of King’s
Chapel UU in Boston, added an historical perspective. In the
Book of Acts, from the 10th or 11th century, he said, Peter
eats with Gentiles but is chastised for eating with non-Jews.
He has a dream that he takes to mean that “what God
has cleansed you should not shun.”
“This story indicates a breaking away from the Jewish
faith and becoming a faith in its own right,” Scovel
said, “with the understanding that faith energy came
from sharing their faith with people outside their faith tradition
or without a faith tradition.
“If sharing of faith is part of the energizing aspect
of faith, then UUs have been on the wrong track.” He
said UU Christians have been defensive about keeping Christianity
alive within the UUA. “Now we realize people are hungry
for faith, the substance of faith, the reality of faith. Now
we have people who are planting churches. There’s a
new energy. People are coming, not out of other denominations.
Out of UU congregations.”
The Rev. Dee Graham spoke of her organizing work in Florida,
Faith Congregation. Its website is www.geocities.com/faithcongregation/faithcongregation.html.
Reported for the web by Kathy Rawle
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