steeples_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

More steeples doing double duty

NEW YORK (RNS)–About 1 percent of all cell phone towers in the United States are housed in church steeples, according to the New York Times.

Cell phone companies that have looked to expand their coverage areas often pay churches between $1,000 and $3,000 a month to rent space in church steeples, said Jim Fryer, a cell phone analyst in Landsdown, Pa.

The steeples provide the height needed to transmit signals and often receive the blessing of urban planners who do not want transmission towers cluttering the skyline.

“When churches were originally built, they wanted them to be the tallest structure in the area–the closest to heaven, or so people could hear the bells,” he told the Times.

Fryer predicted more churches would rent their steeples to cell phone companies as the country's 100,000 towers are expected to triple within the next five years.

In Ipswich, Mass., the landmark steeple on the historic United Methodist Church was destroyed by a lightning strike in 1973. In 1996, under an agreement signed with Bell Atlantic, the steeple was rebuilt, and a cell phone tower was installed.

Still, the phone company brought in a consultant to convince the congregation that they “wouldn't glow on Sunday morning” from radiation, said the church pastor, Bob Ebersole.

Ebersole was unconcerned about sordid conversations that might be relayed through the transmitter in the steeple.

“We don't require a statement of faith from the person that empties our dumpster,” he told the Times.

More churches are projected to rent their steeples to cell phone companies as the country's 100,000 towers triple within the next five years.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




tbm_iraq_60103

Posted: 5/30/03

Texas Baptist Men ship 600
boxes of food donated for Iraqi people

By John Hall

Texas Baptist Communications

DALLAS–Texas Baptist Men has shipped about 600 food boxes donated by Texas churches to Iraq to help with relief efforts.

The cause brought Baptists together to provide boxes that will feed a family of five for a month. Churches in the Austin, Burnet-Llano and Tarrant Baptist associations collected large numbers of boxes. Local churches brought food from Waco, Plains, Gatesville, Dallas and Corsicana.

The Baptist Student Ministry at East Texas Baptist University also pitched in.

Rodney Gant of First Baptist Church in Plano applies to the food boxes stickers that read John 1:17 in Arabic. Texas Baptist Men coordinated shipping the food boxes as part of a national effort by the SBC International Mission Board.

Cooperation between various Baptist groups within the Austin Baptist Association was particularly impressive, according to Associate Director of Missions Randy Newberry. The association collected more than 150 food boxes.

“The exciting thing is seeing the people get excited and keep bringing things,” he said. “This is the kingdom ministering in the name of Jesus.”

Bill Mauldin, a Texas Baptist Men volunteer from Northwest Baptist Church in Austin, said the food drive helped his church be “part of God's kingdom” by “fulfilling God's command to take care of people.”

The boxes, labeled with John 1:17 in Arabic, offer a message of hope and love, he said.

Mission workers in Iraq will determine which families have the most need for the food, and volunteers will take the food to them. While the workers have not been chosen, there's about a 90 percent chance Texas Baptist Men will be present when the distribution time comes, said Cotton Bridges, a vice president for the men's mission movement.

Volunteers will bring the food to the families with a message similar to “God has been good to us, and he's sent some food to you,” according to Bridges, who has delivered relief supplies before. Workers most likely will ask if they can pray for the family, a request Bridges never has seen rejected.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




teens_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Religious teens have stronger family ties

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (RNS) –Teens who are members of religiously involved families are likely to have stronger family relationships than teens in families that are not religiously active, a new report shows.

The findings come from a report by the National Study of Youth and Religion, a four-year research project based at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“All three dimensions of family and parental religious involvement analyzed here (family religious activity, parental religious service attendance and parental prayer) tend to be associated significantly with positive family relationship characteristics,” reads the executive summary of the report.

The findings are published in “Family Religious Involvement and the Quality of Family Relationships for Early Adolescents.”

Looking specifically at youth ages 12 to 14, the report found those in families heavily involved in religious activities are more likely to have strong relationships with their parents and participate in family activities and less likely to run away from home.

Eleven percent of youth fit into this category, where religious activity such as attending church, praying or reading Scriptures together takes place five or more days a week. In comparison, 36 percent of youth are part of families that do not engage in religious activities.

The findings are based on analysis of data from the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth that involved almost 9,000 students. The project that produced the study is funded by Lilly Endowment.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




tidbits_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Texas Tidbits

DBU wins baseball title. In its first appearance in the National Christian College Athletic Association National Championship, Dallas Baptist University claimed the title May 17 with a 4-3 win over top-seeded Spring Arbor University. DBU entered the final round in Celina, Ohio, as the only undefeated team.

Noble Hurley stands with DBU President Gary Cook in front of the sign marking the name of the new apartment building.

bluebull Hurley Hall named. Dallas Baptist University has dedicated one of its new Colonial Village apartment buildings in honor of Noble Hurley and his late wife, Jane. He is a longtime supporter of the school and currently serves as a trustee. He is a member of Gaston Oaks Baptist Church in Dallas and worked 32 years as president of Noble Hurley Brick Co. He also served 20 years as chairman of Swiss Avenue Bank.

bluebull Ball receives Baylor honor. Virginia Beall Ball of Indiana received an honorary doctor of humane letters degree from Baylor University May 17. The 1940 Baylor graduate endowed the Beall-Russell Lecture Series and the Beall Poetry Festival, in addition to other contributions to the university.

bluebull Baylor alumni honor Olson. The Baylor University Alumni Association presented its Price Daniel Distinguished Public Service Award May 17 to Lyndon Olson Jr. of Waco. He is a 1969 Baylor Law School graduate and a former member of the Texas House of Representatives. Currently, he is senior adviser to Citigroup in New York City.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




tithing_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Percentage of tithing households drops

VENTURA, Calif. (RNS)–The portion of American households that tithe, or give one-tenth of their income, to their church dropped from 8 percent in 2001 to 3 percent in 2002, according to the Barna Research Group.

The Ventura, Calif.-based marketing research firm found that groups with the highest proportion of tithers were people ages 55 or older, college graduates, Republicans, Southerners, conservatives, middle-income individuals, evangelicals, and those who attend mainline Protestant churches.

Those least likely to tithe included Hispanics, liberals, Catholics, parents who home-school their children, Midwesterners, those not registered to vote or registered as independents, and households earning less than $20,000 and without a head of household who graduated from college.

George Barna, president of Barna Research Group, attributed the drop in tithers to a range of reasons.

“For some, the soft economy has either diminished their household income or led to concerns about their financial security,” he said. “For others, the nation's political condition, in terms of terrorism and the war in … Iraq, has raised their level of caution. The scandals involving Catholic priests last year reduced some people's confidence in church leaders and, consequently, reduced their giving as well.”

The findings are based on a nationwide telephone survey of 1,010 adults in late January and early February, which has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




together_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

TOGETHER:
Texas needs more new churches

With 5,716 churches and missions related to the Baptist General Convention of Texas, there is one Texas Baptist congregation for every 3,761 people in our state. In five years, a projected 1.7 million people will be added to our current population of 21.8 million Texans–10.5 million of whom are not a part of any faith community.

If we are to continue serving Texas as we have, we must start at least 1,100 congregations in the next five years. We are off to a good start. The BGCT Church Starting Center's Genesis Project goal is for Texas Baptists to start 777 churches in three years, and we helped to start 264 this past year.

CHARLES WADE
Executive Director
BGCT Executive Board

We estimate we will lose about 600 churches and missions over the next five years due to disbandment and mergers. Over the past five years, 718 churches have uniquely aligned with the other state convention, and 254 have entered into a dual alignment with them while remaining connected to the BGCT as well. Last year, our loss of churches to the other convention was less than 17 percent of the previous year, and we added 3.5 churches for every one that joined the other convention.

Every church is precious to me and to the BGCT. Our staff is determined to serve every congregation with our full resources. It grieves me to lose any church in our cooperative efforts to do the work of ministry and mission through our institutions, mission efforts and service ministries to local churches. We are grateful for the thousands of churches and more than 2 million Texas Baptists who are continuing to work together to respond faithfully to the needs of this great state and our world.

A careful look at the population distribution of our state shows that new churches need to be concentrated in areas where our state is growing. By 2008, 86 percent of the population will be living in 58 metropolitan counties. There will be an urban corridor stretching from Denton County down I-35 to Bexar County (San Antonio) and then stretching east to Harris County (Houston). There will no longer be a non-metropolitan county in that L-shaped urban concentration. The Rio Grande Valley and El Paso will be the other large population centers. Seven other cities will be in counties having greater than 100,000 populations–Amarillo, Abilene, Corpus Christi, Laredo, Lubbock, Midland/Odessa and Wichita Falls.

The ethnic distribution of our citizens will continue to change in the next five years. In 2003, our population is 51 percent Anglo, 34 percent Hispanic, 12 percent African-American and 3 percent other. Demographers tell us that in 2008, the distribution will be 49 percent Anglo, 36 percent Hispanic, 11 percent African-American and 4 percent other. In real numbers, there will be an increase of 1.2 million Hispanics, 203,000 Anglos, 154,000 African-Americans and 135,000 made up of all others.

The good news for Texas Baptist efforts in starting churches is that more than half of our church starts have been among Hispanics over the last few years. Our churches and our Church Starting Center have seen the challenge and are responding to it.

Texas is a mission base and a mission field. Your convention and its Executive Board staff are committed to being available to God with all we have in being good stewards of the trust placed in our hands.

We are loved.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




twins_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Born together, baptized together,
82-year-old blind twins open eyes

By George Henson

Staff Writer

DALLAS–They were together at birth, and yet again at the baptism ceremony symbolizing their rebirth 82 years later.

Margie Beryl Hejkal and her twin brother, Ross Meryl Barnes, recently were baptized at Calvary Baptist Church of Oak Cliff in Dallas.

Pastor Ted Kiser had Barnes put his arm around his sister's shoulder and the pair, both blind, were baptized simultaneously.

Pastor Ted Kiser (left) baptizes Margie Beryl Hejkal and Ross Meryl Barnes with assistance from Bob Mathews. The 82-year-old twins, both blind, opened the eyes of Calvary Baptist Church to the need for evangelism among senior adults.

“We dunked them together,” Kiser said. “My wife and I were baptized together, and it just makes it real special. All through my ministry I've given husbands and wives and brothers and sisters and such that option.”

The simultaneous spiritual soaking is sometimes especially meaningful for young married couples, Kiser said. “That way when they have a time when they may feel like leaving, and most people do at one time or another, it gives them a memory that's a little more special that may help them get through whatever it is they're going through,” he said.

Hejkal first came to the South Dallas church through the encouragement of her neighbor and friend Dolly Wisdom. Hejkal told Wisdom that while she had been in and out of churches for most of her life, she wasn't sure she was a Christian.

During the altar call at the next Sunday's worship service, she told Kiser the same thing.

“I told her: 'If you've been saved, you're still saved. If you're not saved, let's go through the plan of salvation while the Holy Spirit is dealing with you.'”

Hejkal made a profession of faith that morning and plans were made for her baptism.

After she returned home, she called her brother at his home in Tulsa, Okla. “Well, he caught the next plane down,” Kiser reported. “He told her, 'You're not going to do this by yourself.'”

His sister didn't know what to do about the situation. She called Kiser and said: “We may have a problem. My brother's coming down here, and he thinks he's going to be baptized.”

Kiser didn't see that as a problem, but as an opportunity. He presented the gospel to Barnes, who also made a profession of faith in Christ, and the way was paved for a baptism neither Kiser nor his congregation soon will forget.

“It was really something special,” Kiser said. “Their being 82 was awesome, then twins, and both being blind. It's just a very unique situation.”

The pastor said the pair were by far the oldest people he has baptized.

And the experience was an eye-opener for his congregation as well, he said. “Somehow there's this thought that everybody past 70 is saved, but that's not the case.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




under_god_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Bush administration asks court to allow 'under God'

WASHINGTON (RNS)–The Bush administration has formally asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overrule a lower court decision and allow the Pledge of Allegiance to include the words “one nation under God.”

U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson said last summer's ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that said the pledge violates the separation of church and state is “manifestly contrary” to previous church-state cases.

“Whatever else the (First Amendment) may prohibit, this court's precedents make it clear that it does not forbid the government from officially acknowledging the religious heritage, foundation and character of this nation,” Olson wrote in his argument.

California atheist Michael Newdow sued in 2000, saying his daughter should not be forced to listen to the Pledge of Allegiance in her classroom. The first court to hear the case dismissed it, but the San Francisco-based appeals court ruled in Newdow's favor.

A three-judge panel found that the phrase “one nation under God”–inserted into the pledge in 1954–amounts to government endorsement of religion. The court's ruling affected only the nine Western states in its jurisdiction.

But after a public outcry, the court stepped back and stayed its decision pending appeals. On March 3, the court refused to change its decision. “We may not–we must not–allow public sentiment or outcry to guide our decisions,” Judge Stephen Reinhardt wrote.

Olson also questioned whether Newdow could bring the suit since he does not have custody of his daughter. After the initial ruling, the girl's mother said she had no problem with her daughter reciting or hearing the pledge.

Newdow and his attorneys will now have a chance to respond. Four of the court's nine justices, however, must vote to hear the case. Olson said the appeals court ruling is so “irreconcilable” with earlier decisions that it should be overturned without the oral arguments and a formal ruling from the high court.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




wayland_team_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Wayland sends out revival team

By Jonathan Petty

Wayland Baptist University

PLAINVIEW–Wayland Baptist University will extend the reach of its student summer missions teams this year with a new Lighting the Way revival team.

The team is fashioned after the Shine Out revival teams that were sponsored by the Baptist General Convention of Texas several years ago.

Lewis Mahannah
Rieff Weaver

The Lighting the Way team will serve in addition to Wayland's existing student groups, Rejoice and Rec Team.

Wayland's four-member revival team will visit 10 churches in West Texas this summer.

Although the BGCT stopped funding the Shine Out teams due to budget cuts, “there is still a need for that type of ministry,” said Micheal Summers, director of church services at Wayland.

In fact, the Wayland team was created in direct response to requests from churches, he reported. “The request came in this school year, and we have put a team together. We are responding as soon as we can.”

The team will be led by sophomore Shawn Mahannah, who will serve as the speaker/preacher of the group. Senior Josh Rieff will lead worship, while freshman Anne Weaver and sophomore Britany Lewis will work with the children and youth.

Lining up 10 churches to participate in the endeavor was no problem, Summers said. “The need is greater than what we can supply.”

Experiences lined up for this summer are diverse. The team will work with Genesis Baptist Church, a Hispanic congregation that has been restarted just a few blocks from the Wayland campus in Plainview. And they also will lead a youth camp at the beach for First Baptist Church of Junction.

Unlike Rejoice and the REC Teams, the Lighting the Way team is not employed by the school. The team works on a volunteer basis. Churches are asked to provide $250 for travel expenses and to take care of the team's room and board for the week, but no salary is involved.

“This is definitely a missions commitment,” Summers said, “to give 10 weeks of your summer to be in different churches every week with a different pastor every week, doing different activities every week.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




wayland_center_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

The first phase of Wayland's Laney Center will include a gym, track, weight training and aerobics areas.

Wayland plans new student recreation center

PLAINVIEW–Wayland Baptist University will break ground by the end of this year on phase one of the Pete and Nelda Laney Student Activities Center.

President Paul Armes announced May 16 that the 51,010-square-foot facility will be constructed in two phases in order to expedite its use.

The first phase, to be constructed at a cost of $4.4 million, will include a double gymnasium, indoor track, weight training and aerobics area, classrooms, dressing rooms and a student lounge. The second phase will add an Olympic-size natatorium.

University officials said the activity center will provide a much-needed fitness and wellness facility for students. The facility also will be the center for intramural sports.

Currently, Wayland has no recreational athletics facilities for students.

“I see this center as becoming the heart and soul of student life on campus,” said Wayland Vice President Russ Gibbs.

The building will be named in honor of State Rep. Pete Laney, D-Hale Center, and his wife, Nelda, to recognize their support for higher education in Texas.

In an effort to meet the students' needs more quickly, administrators have deviated from the original plan in order to construct the planned facility in two phases.

Armes told members of a fund-raising steering committee the new activities center “has greater potential for the recruiting and retention of students than any other project we've done in the last 10 years.”

“We believe the Laney Center will serve as an enticement to stay on the campus and in the area,” he said. “This helps us maintain a safe and secure supervised environment for our students as they recreate.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




workplace_bill_60203

Posted: 5/30/03

Broad coalition supporting workplace freedom bill

By Kevin Eckstrom

Religion News Service

WASHINGTON–An unusually broad coalition of religious groups is pushing a bill that would protect religious expression in the workplace. But civil liberties groups are concerned the bill could be used to advance on-the-job proselytizing.

The Workplace Religious Freedom Act, introduced by Sens. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., and John Kerry, D-Mass., would force employers to “reasonably accommodate” employees who want to wear religious articles or take time off for worship services.

Current law mandates that employers allow such expression as long as it does not impose an “undue hardship” on the company. Supporters, however, say a 1977 Supreme Court ruling gutted the law and has not protected employees' rights.

“America is distinguished internationally as a land of religious freedom,” Santorum said in introducing the bill. “It should be a place where people should not be forced to choose between keeping their faith and keeping their job.”

The American Jewish Committee, one of the bill's primary backers, point to cases like Amric Singh Rathour, who was fired as a New York City traffic cop when he refused to shave his religiously mandated beard or remove his turban. Rathour's suit against the city, filed in March, is pending.

The AJC also defended a New York Rastafarian who was fired from his job at FedEx when he refused to cut his dreadlocks, a part-time Methodist minister who was fired from a furniture store for taking time off to conduct a funeral, and a Muslim woman who was fired from Alamo Rent-A-Car for insisting that she wear a headscarf.

Religious groups, including Seventh-day Adventists, Muslims, Southern Baptists, the National Council of Churches and others, say religious minorities are especially vulnerable to discrimination.

“We need a stronger position so that employers are not denying what is reasonable,” said Clarence Hodges, director of public affairs and religious liberty for the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, who take Saturday as their Sabbath. “They need to understand that 'reasonable' means reasonable, and that you can do what you need to do without upsetting everything and everybody.”

The employer mandate was inserted into Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act in 1972. Five years later, however, the Supreme Court ruled that even a minimal hardship on employers was not covered under the act.

The new bill would define “undue hardship” as something that imposes “significant difficulty or expense” on the employer or that would keep an employee from carrying out the “essential functions” of the job. The law does not apply to businesses with fewer than 15 employees.

Business lobbyists have stalled attempts to advance the bill for almost a decade. And the American Civil Liberties Union, which has defended the rights of religious employees in so-called “appearance and scheduling” cases, said the current bill is too broad.

Christopher Anders, the ACLU's legislative counsel, said the new law would sanction activities by employees that have not been allowed under current law, such as a Catholic Chicago police officer who refused to guard an abortion clinic, or a state nurse in Connecticut who, while visiting the home of a gay AIDS patient, condemned the man's lifestyle and told him to repent.

Anders said there are no protections in the bill to prohibit an employee from forcing religious beliefs on other workers or from allowing a worker to dictate his or her duties because of religious or moral convictions.

Nathan Diament, Washington director for the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, dismissed such “slippery slope” predictions.

“You can turn anything into a law school hypothetical, but we feel that this bill does not obviously allow for those kinds of things,” Diament said.

The bill, S. 893, is awaiting action in the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.




mclaren_60203

Book reimagines evangelism
for a post-apologetic world

By Greg Warner

Associated Baptist Press

SPENCERVILLE, Md. (ABP)–What can the mating habits of tortoises teach humans about their spiritual connection to God?

Most people never would think to ask such a question. But most people don't think like Brian McLaren.

Brian McLaren

Since childhood, McLaren has been fascinated with nature. “Turtles, birds, all wildlife, geology, weather,” he explained. “It's kind of a spiritual thing for me.”

Nature, tortoises and evolution figure prominently in McLaren's new book, “The Story We Find Ourselves In.” It's a sequel to his popular but somewhat controversial “A New Kind of Christian.” Both books are written in an unusual narrative non-fiction style–using fictional characters, rather than sterile discourse, to incarnate theological truths.

Much of “The Story We Find Ourselves In” is set in the Galápagos Islands, the same islands that helped Charles Darwin forge his evolutionary theories. Gigantic tortoises are among the famous wildlife of the islands (galápagos is Spanish for turtle). And the storyline allowed McLaren to indulge his passion for tortoises–10 make their home in his Maryland backyard and winter in his basement.

The central character is once again Neil Edward Oliver (Neo for short), a Jamaican preacher-turned-science teacher whose easy manner and unorthodox views somehow manage to guide Christians and seekers through crises of life and faith.

Neo is the prototype in Brian McLaren's experiment to reimagine evangelism for a post-apologetic world. Neo's latest adventure is likely to stir some controversy as well, because the hero extols evolution as testimony of God's creative imagination.

“Nature is God's artwork, God's text, showing us so much about the Creator,” McLaren told FaithWorks magazine. “I am very respectful of what I can learn from nature.”

Prophetic voice

The author is in fact a teacher-turned-preacher, a former English professor who's now pastor of a non-denominational church outside Washington, D.C. But he's more than a pastor with a knack for writing.

McLaren often is cited as a leading voice of the next generation of evangelicals. And he's a key figure in the “emerging church,” a mostly under-the-radar movement of Christian leaders in their 20s and 30s that is beginning to toss a few waves on the shores of evangelicalism.

In “The Story We Find Ourselves In,” McLaren is not just teaching spiritual object lessons from nature. His goal is much more ambitious. He wants to show that faith and science are not natural enemies, that together they tell the story of God's creative purpose.

“One of our crises, as we enter the postmodern world, is that Christianity has presented itself as a system of belief instead of a story. And we got on adversarial terms with science.”

When science sought to explain the world without God, it produced a story without meaning, McLaren said. And Christians, trying to recast the gospel in the language of science and reason, produced a propositional belief system that lost touch with the story that gave it power.

“I am interested in seeing science and faith as collaborators,” McLaren said.

Nature can teach Christians about diversity and interdependence, said McLaren, who contends both will characterize the future church.

“Life evolves to thrive in many different niches,” and the same should be true among Christians, he said. “We need incredible diversity to fill many, many niches.”

Interdependence, although imbedded in nature, is foreign to the Western individualism so ingrained in American Christianity. That's why McLaren's “new kind of Christian” often uses words like “journey” and “conversation” to describe Christian life beyond the postmodern divide.

Starting a conversation

Conversation implies Christians can learn a lot by interacting with–and listening to–the world, especially non-Christians.

“Their questions are an essential facet of our discipleship,” McLaren said. “They change us.”

“Jesus said we shouldn't worry when people ask us questions; the Spirit will guide us. That says to me there are things we're going to learn when we engage people missionally that we would not learn any other way.”

McLaren and his cohorts emphasize dialogue over debate, community over individualism, experience over proof. They willingly shed the modernist expectation that Christians should have all the answers. Critics accuse them of abandoning all absolutes. But most postmodern Christians don't deny absolutes exist–only that they can be proclaimed unequivocally, without hesitation or humility.

“Certainty is overrated,” McLaren declares. “God calls us to faith and to seek the kingdom.”

There is great danger in the quest to be right, he warns. “History teaches us that a lot of people thought they were certain, and we found out they weren't.”

Likewise, cookie-cutter formulas and go-it-alone strategies will be ill-suited for the church in the new world.

“Our theology and the way we treat people, this to me is really the big issue,” McLaren said. He quotes a fellow staff member who contends their church could trade its contemporary worship style for the Episcopal liturgy and it wouldn't change the character of the church.

“All the things people focus on–style of music and so on–are all much less significant than we realize. One reason we have to pay so much attention to 'cosmetics' is because we are trying to market a message that is very much flawed. We think the gospel is about how to get individual souls into heaven when they die, when for Jesus the message was about the kingdom of God, which is a here-and-now experience, not just a heavenly one, and a communal experience, not just an individual one, and involves all of creation, not just an invisible part of us called our soul.”

Unlikely preacher

Such bold statements can sneak up on the listener, who's easily lulled by McLaren's soft-spoken and winsome manner. The unimposing pastor is not a likely suspect to lead a theological movement, or even to lead a church.

“I'm a total misfit,” he admitted. “I'm a middle-aged bald guy without proper credentials.”

His training is not in theology but in English–a bachelor's and master's from the University of Maryland–and he backed into the pastorate. While in graduate school, McLaren and his wife, Grace, started a Bible study in their home. It attracted mostly graduate students and faculty and in 1982 took the shape of a house church. McLaren led the church while teaching English composition at the university. But as the congregation grew, so did the demands.

“I was either going to have to step back or step in,” he said. In 1986 he left academia to become pastor of the congregation, which became Cedar Ridge Community Church.

Although he never went to seminary, McLaren first bumped up against postmodernism much earlier than most seminary students or pastors.

“In graduate school in the '70s, postmodernism was first hitting the academy through literary criticism. I was exposed to deconstructionism and postmodern thought. I remember thinking, if this kind of thought catches on, Christianity is in real trouble.”

It would be another two decades before the conversation migrated into Christian circles. But for McLaren, the questions raised in those classroom discussions always “simmered on the back burner.”

A new way of thinking

Then he began to detect something different about the young non-believers Cedar Ridge was attracting. “I thought, oh no, that new way of thinking is the way all the people who walk through the doors of our church are thinking.”

He began to re-examine the way he understood the gospel story, particularly the modern, rational formulations and apologetic evangelism he picked up from his Reformed background.

“I went through a real personal theological and faith struggle in the mid-'90s,” he recalled. “I didn't know any other Christians who were struggling with these issues.”

He stumbled upon “Truth Is Stranger than it Used to Be,” by Richard Middleton and Brian Walsh, and later the writings of Leonard Sweet.

“I was so relieved to find at least a few people talking about these things,” he confessed.

Today, McLaren writes “to help get a conversation started” about the Christian faith, he said modestly, but also “to free our understanding of the gospel from these modern categories.”

His earlier book, “A New Kind of Christian,” provoked conversation within the evangelical establishment, not all of it pleasant. Although most reviews were positive, a few were “blistering.” The book was the subject of a four-part analysis in “Books and Culture” last year.

The book questioned Christianity's sometimes clumsy, sometimes costly, accommodation to modern rationalism. Critics said McLaren either offered nothing new or abandoned centuries of essential tradition.

“The people who dislike the book the most tend to be strict, high Calvinists,” McLaren said. That makes sense, he adds, because Calvinism “is the highest expression of modernism.” But he is heartened by the response he receives from other readers, most of whom praise its fresh approach. Some of that affirmation comes from older evangelicals who nonetheless recognize that traditional expressions of the gospel “have turned off their children and grandchildren.”

McLaren seems untroubled that he may not be embraced by the evangelical mainstream. “What I'm really excited about is the next 20-to-30 young leaders who are planting churches, who are in seminary, women as well as men, minorities. They're getting to start so much further along.”

Influence expanding

This “misfit” has quietly earned the respect of the thought leaders, innovative pastors, church starters and entrepreneurs who make up the rag-tag “emerging church” movement. Although McLaren, 46, is older than many in the movement, they usually look to him for leadership. Those young leaders value not only McLaren's insights but the charitable tone he sets for the postmodern conversation.

“Brian has moved beyond simple deconstruction and stone-throwing to a much more productive combination of healthy critique along with future-thinking and praxis,” said Mark Oestreicher of Youth Specialties.

To these younger leaders, McLaren's status gives him credibility. “I wasn't indoctrinated. I wasn't socialized into that. There's a certain perspective you have on the fringe of things,” McLaren said.

Raised among the tiny Plymouth Brethren, shaped by the Jesus Movement, trained in the secular academy, impassioned by art, music, philosophy and nature–McLaren doesn't fit neatly into any evangelical stereotype. But that works to his advantage in an era whose zeitgeist is eclectic, holistic and global.

“I'm not interested in saving evangelicalism or reforming evangelicalism, although others might have that calling. My dream is that there could be a conversation and a friendship among grass-roots leaders and theologians in evangelical, mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic and Orthodox communities, and in some small way that this kind of broad friendship could bring new possibilities to Christian churches around the world.”

“I really see a convergence happening,” he added.

Already McLaren sees evidence that young Christians are more willing to look past doctrinal differences to find fellowship. They see denominations as “structures for connection rather than barriers for isolation.” They are more open to the wisdom and practices of the ancient church and non-evangelical traditions–“resources grossly undervalued in recent decades.”