I just finished the book UnChristian, following Pagan Christianity a few months ago, and I wonder, can church as I know it ever reach the Busters and Mosaics?
What would that church have to look like? What would be core values?
To battle the perception of the church as antihomosexual a core value would have to be not accepting or rejecting a person due to their sexual orientation. The church would have to be a community that opens it's arms to everyone, understanding that we are all in different places in our faith journey, and providing opportunities for everyone to use their gifts in loving obedience to God.
To battle the perception that the church is judgemental a core value would have to be the ability to accept everyone, working to develop vibrant personal relationships between all of its' members. It's ministries would have to be intentionally multi-generational, fostering relationships between all ages, races, and genders.
To battle the perception that the church is hypocritical a core value would have to be honesty and integrity, modeled in leadership, reinforced in teaching, and expected of everyone. Members would have to be willing to hold themselves accountable to each other.
It would have to be unlike any church I've been to, willing to lay down what it has always seen as "church" in the interest of reaching those for whom Church is a dirty word.
I wonder what it would look like. Would there be sermons, homilies, teaching times, shared teaching? Would there be sacraments, and if so, which and how? Singing? Band? Internet, videos, powerpoint? Where would it meet, a home, a public building, a coffee shop, a sanctuary?
The challenge is huge and somwhate frightening and exciting and stimulating, the goal to create an UnChurch to battle the UnChristian label. And yet if what Kinnaman and Lyons have learned is true, do we truly have a choice?
