Emerging Spirit @ The United Church of Canada Emerging Spirit @ The United Church of Canada

Photo: Mathieu Struck*

The modern age was ushered in by the Enlightenment (mid-1600s to early 1800s). One characteristic of the Enlightenment framework was a rejection of tradition and religious sources of authority in favour of reason and knowledge. Over time, the modern age became wed to the idea of progress and the conviction that science had the ability to make things bigger and better and to solve any problem that arose. The deep assumption was that if and when we could control the natural world we would continue to grow in wealth, health, and leisure.

In the modern age religion became private - a personal matter between ourselves and God, a principle enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. Reason and knowledge were part of the public realm - this is the time of the rise in public schools, universities, political parties, as well as capitalism. In the modern age we sought certainty, freedom, and progress.

Most of us in the church were born and raised in the modern age or by modern-age parents. At most, we will be students of the postmodern age.

Postmodernity refers to the progressive loss of confidence in the Enlightenment framework and process. Since 1945 the air has gone out of the Enlightenment balloon, with rapid deflation during the 1970s and 1980s.

Postmodernity has given birth to Green politics and anti-consumerism. Anxiety and fear seem to be more prevalent, perhaps a result of declining confidence that we can solve the challenges ahead - short and long term - through using science and reason. In the postmodern world, knowledge is no longer seen as inherently good. Alongside this culture of suspicion has also grown a new emphasis and delight in inclusivity and wonder. 

As society moves along the shift from modern to postmodern, what are some of the implications for the church and ministry?

Excerpted from the Emerging Spirit booklet, "Congregational Ministry in a New World," which can be downloaded here in full, along with study questions (log in required).

*Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mathieustruck/212751235/

The Christian church seeks to be a community rooted in faith and engaged in the world.

We root ourselves in faith through worship, spiritual practices, caring for each other, and learning together. We yearn to share our faith with those we love and with a world that is hungry for spiritual food. We want our own lives to have meaning, to make a difference for good in God's world.

All of this means that God calls us into relationship with the world, all of the world, not just those people who look like us and think like us. We are called to understand this world in which God calls us to minister.

The world has changed! And you know this.

We no longer live in a world where:

Share is a website which offers how-to advice on starting, developing, and sustaining fresh expressions of church based on shared experiences. Sponsored by Fresh Expressions and ChurchArmy, two organizations based in the United Kingdom which work toward the development and renewal of Christian community, the Share site is a resource for those involved with innovative expressions of church.

Among Share's growing list of resources includes a helpful overview of café-style churches which are growing in popularity in many places. Share looks at a variety of café / church hybrids, including café-style events on church premises, Christian events in commercial cafés, commercial cafés run by Christians, and doing mission within existing cafés.

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