i think steve hollinghurst’s comment is very helpful and names better than i could why i was trying to suggest in my blog post that the issue you are addressing is not a question that was in the room on the recent weekend away with people who have left, returned, stayed out, never were part of or never left instiutions.

Was the early movement you describe a negation of the institutions, which is now going through a process of negating that negation i.e. not simply negating the institutions nor returning to them but moving into a third place that finds new shape and expression in relationship to and in the institutions?

I think there may be elements of that, and I think this is something Jonny would want to see, and probably will see with the new models CMS are working with. But I also think there is simply a more straightforward return, which perhaps sees the move out in retrospect as more of a ‘rumspinga’, as I’ve noted.

Spence, that’s good stuff. I like the Schopenhauer quote a lot, and it resonates well with the stuff on pirates functioning as cultural heretics which is also in the book – they give permission to something which is heretical, are vilified for it, but it is then accepted as the norm.

I don’t think it has retreated. But I do think the conversation has had its desired outcome as a catalyst. To think about the Church beyond the walls, religion or human control – back to the people, tribe, work of the Spirit. Here is a little piece I posted on Facebook and TheOOZE.com. Does this resonate with you?

“One of the difficulties I think we will encounter in this conversation is – we have lived with the illusion of the “Emerging Church”. Just like those who are defending the “Modern Church” today against the coming heresy…

Someday those who are defending the church today will realize that it was the loss of modernity that they were grieving. And those who are so eager to be the torch bearers for the emerging church will be left with a new institution to feed. But for some, the Church will always be the Church and she will continue to surprise us…”

http://www.theooze.com/articles/article.cfm?id=2407

To be sure, we all read selectively, and the issue is trying to avoid the ‘highly’.

On the other hand, it may be that people are doing valid interpretations of their writing within a context that the authors themselves couldn’t inhabit because of their own back-stories? That may be too generous to emerging authors who are quoting them – but as I say I’m not particularly up on them, so wouldn’t like to say.

And as this process continues, most of us need peers, mentors and supporters- which turns us back towards established church.

Or it seems to do for many. We are still out there at the moment- and I agree with Andrew that many others still feel excluded from ALL forms of church…

Cheers

Chris

Like your

I’d also ask to what extent the emerging church demographic might have contributed to this return (noting that I have had extremely limited engagement with this movement), with 2 things in mind:

1) Pragmatically, a lot of the emerging movement seemed to be made up of energetic, young, often trendy types; I wonder if some of this is that those people have settled into careers, had children, and are looking for an environment the whole family can take part in together, perhaps without expending so much creative energy?

2) Theologically, it always seemed to me that the emerging church people were reading a lot of theology, and constantly trying to respond to what they were reading. I wonder if a consequence of engaging widely with theology is a pull toward the institution. I can think of many examples of Protestant theologians who turn Catholic late in their career (life), and indeed low-church Protestants who turn to Anglicanism or Lutheranism. Perhaps wide engagement in theology somehow pushes people in this direction generally.