From the Rector's Study ~
“While Paul was waiting…in Athens,…he argued in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and also in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. Also some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers debated with him. Some said, "What does this babbler want to say?" Others said, "He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign divinities." This was because he was telling the good news about Jesus and the resurrection. So they took him and brought him to the Areopagus and asked him, "May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting?
It sounds rather strange to us, so we would like to know what it means." Now all the Athenians and the foreigners living there would spend their time in nothing but telling or hearing something new. Then Paul stood in front of the Areopagus and said, "Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way. For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, "To an unknown god.' What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.” (Act 17:16-23).
As a 1st century Christian, Paul met with the Athenians for argument and debate. Our own cultural equivalents are conversation and discussion. Though less assertive forms of communication than their ancient counterparts, they can be just as effective for the Church in its mission to interpret the good news of Jesus to the community and culture around it in every age. Twenty centuries since Paul’s time have brought an incredible variety of cultures into immediate contact with one another. All around us you and I meet a multiplicity of cultures that are defined variously by age and generation, race and ethnicity, gender, socio-economic status, sexual orientation, physical and mental ability, educational background, and by sources of cultural influence that are only now still being discerned.
Thankfully, our spiritual gift here at ECR is hospitality. Our natural or supernatural zeal to welcome in anyone and everyone equips us with a strong desire to respond to the mandate we have as Christians. The project of interpretation or translation is a complex one, a skill that we must cultivate. Toward that end, it is important for us to know how people around us are perceiving the Church, the Christian faith, and Christians in general.
Researcher David Kinnaman offers valuable insight in his recent book, Unchristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity…and Why It Matters. Kinnaman demonstrates that despite the ways you and I may define ourselves from within the Church, many people outside the Church looking in regard us in specifically unfavorable ways. The research shows that the most common negative perceptions are, in order: 1) “Antihomosexual”, i.e., people believe that “Christians are bigoted and show disdain for gays and lesbians…[being] fixated on curing homosexuals and on leveraging political solutions against them.” 2) Judgmental”, i.e., people “doubt that we really love people as we say we do.” 3) “Hypocritical”, i.e., people believe that “we say one thing and do another,” pretending that “the Church is a place only for virtuous and morally pure people.” 4) “Too political”, i.e., that “we promote and represent politically conservative interests and issues.” 5) “Out of touch with reality”, i.e., that we prefer “simplistic solutions and answers” and are “not willing to deal with the girt and grime of people’s lives.” 6) “Old-fashioned”, i.e., that we do not respond to reality in appropriately complex ways.” 7) “Insensitive to others”, i.e., “outsiders wonder if we really care about them…[making them] feel like targets rather than people.” 8) “Boring”, i.e., that people perceive the Church “as weak…a nice Sunday drive…[missing] the relevance of Jesus to our culture.” 9) “Not accepting of other faiths”, i.e., that “we are not honest about our attitudes about other people…” leaving people “skeptical of our morally superior attitudes.” And 10) “Confusing”; i.e., that “the [Christian] faith has changed for the worse,…gotten off the track, and is not what Christ intended; [that] modern-day Christianity no longer seems Christian.” Though some of this news may well be jarring, we’ll do well also to recognize that it is instructive. With greater understanding of the perceptions of the outsider, you and I can better equip ourselves and our fellow Christians to interpret the gospel to people around us. We can also help God to equip the former outsider to find our welcome here at ECR and the Love of God for all, so that he or she can carry on the effort in their turn. We here at ECR are committed to communicating the eternal blessings of the Faith as Jesus has bequeathed it to us in ways that are meaningful to an evolving complex of cultures around us. This is the driving interest behind the makeover of our campus. It is part of our focus upon expanding our conversation and discussion with the communities and cultures around us.
Venturing into unfamiliar ways of thinking, speaking, and listening is the heart of ECR’s mission and ministry. My expectation is that these efforts will be exciting for us all. And when a particular effort seems jarring, let’s help one another to remember that the Church’s mission to communicate God’s Love of all to the world around us is alive and well here at ECR, here with us Christians of the 21st century.
God’s Peace.
Jim +
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