In November we are of on a Skate Pilgrimage with some young people for the Church on the Edge project. We are working through the process of being
A Contacting Community – Through detached youth work
A Growing Community- Through ongoing contact and residential
A Connecting Community – Through undertaking a rite of passage committing to journey together
An Exploring Community – Through connecting stories and life
An Ecclesial Community – Through living together with a missionary DNA
So we are up to to this rite of passage stage. The rite of passage story is one of the hero leaving behind where they were, battling their enemy, and returning the hero accepted and endorsed by the community. It is this last section that I am concerned about.
One of the premises of Church on the edge at this stage is not about the young people coming to faith through this rite of passage, but being willing to commit to explore with us and be church together, regardless of their faith position. The yp are willing to do this, yet my initial reading on the rite of passage it is the reception of the broader community is a vital part of the process. The project is essentially saying to these yp “you are now part of the church” but who and how do we get this accepted by the wider and or local church. What does this look like?
In some ways the issue is further compounded by how we view the project. Namly that in many ways we are already being church with the young people, yet others may not agree. Some would argue that by going through this rite of passage we have moved towards being church, yet we are in part asking hard questions of what church is and how we be church, do sacrements etc. Importantly we are enabling the young people (who have asigned to the faith) to decide with us how we are church, be church, express sacrement etc. So asking another to endorse such an open journey is problematic.
I wonder if the emerging church so far only been endorsed by the wider church community because they came from those communities in the first place and they were not seeking this endorsement but it arose over time, when perhaps the journey had already been charted and they were safer to endorse.
Anyone for some comments/thoughts/dialogue?
I guess it depends upon each party thinking that people in other church(s) are of the same faith. However, there are churches that don’t believe any other churches do share the same faith. I can understand why the young people of church on the edge might not relate to the faith of people in existing churches, but this will be partly through a lack of contact, relationship and understanding and partly be due to the rubbish that the churches have managed to fill up their time doing. Similarly those in the churches might not accept the young people’s commitment as brothers and sisters in faith.
But there is no point judging people’s faith and commitment when you don’t know them. I hope that I just take each person and each relationship at a time and relate to that person in the way I find appropriate, either as a brother/sister or as someone I might reach out to.
I should qualify: As you know, I’m a believer in exclusive church. 🙂 That kind of hangs on my definition of church being the meeting of the followers of Christ.
mark I love the fact we are complete opposite on this. maybe it is like left and right politics and we will rejoin at some point
I guess it might be easier to reframe your question using language that we have in common: As we disagree on what church is, it is perhaps better to ignore the word church and instead talk about what we actually have a shared understanding of. So perhaps the question would read:
“The project is essentially saying to these yp “you are now part of *something*â€? but who and how do we get this accepted by the wider and or local church. What does this look like?”
Although somehow that sounds facetious! 🙁
Perhaps you could define ‘where’ you think the yp are? (saying ‘church’ isn’t very helpful because we don’t share the same definition of church) Just so that we might be able to figure out how we should relate to them.
I think that, just like you do, every Christian does discriminate between people. Every Christian chooses who they have close intimate fellowship with and who they will relate to on other levels. Just as you treat me differently to people who reject the message of Christ (that you bring to them) and just as you treat me differently to people who have neither accepted nor rejected that message. You discriminate between these people and how you will treat them in pretty much the same way I do and we both hope that we discriminate between them in the way Christ did/does. I am of course talking about discriminating in order to love people rather as a basis for hating them.
Perhaps the question, therefore, should be:
“The project is essentially saying to these yp “you are now part of *something*â€? but *in what way should we expect to be* accepted by the wider and or local church. What does this look like?”
My answer to that would be that I hope the wider or local church treat these young people as people beloved by God whether they accept him, reject him or don’t really know.
I should clarify that the position of accepting and rejecting are positions that people actively take, but that there are a lot of people in the grey area in between who don’t really know the available positions (e.g. haven’t become aware of God) or people who are gravitating toward one of those polar positions, but haven’t yet told people what they think, perhaps because they are unsure themselves of what they think.
Maybe a better starting point than discussing ‘what is Church’? would be to think about What is a Christian? and How does a person become a Christian? Perhaps once these are answered then the idea of who / what constitutes Church may be better explained.
I like the story of someone experiencing a sense of spiritiual ‘Flow’ whilst on their skatboard that I read in another article. But a person becoming a Christian is surely something much more powerful than this.
Perhaps Chard Church on the Edge have had some thoughts on these questions through their experiences over the past months?
ps sorry about the delay in coming into this discussion, but have only just found these pages out via the wetpaint website.
Hi Warwick,
I’m not sure if the point (of the post) is whether or not those associated with CotE are Christians or not, but is rather whether or not they are accepted by the existing churches as part of CotE and thus as part of the church…
…or perhaps I have misunderstood the post?