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

"A Few Thoughts on Numbers, Decline, and What We Might Do"

From the blog of the moderator of the Presbyterian church (USA), Bruce Reyes-Chow, comes a meditation on declining membership numbers in this major American mainline denomination. According to the moderator, the denomination's membership numbers have declined by another seventy thousand this year, and people have reasons that they send Reyes-Chow's way. "The church is too liberal!", "The church is too conservative!", and more.

Reyes-Chow responds with thoughts on the complexity of the situation, the ambivalence of numbers, and the failure of the church's institutional worldview (bringing with it a failure to adapt). To start the process of breaking this worldview and making the church more flexible, Reyes-Chow proposes some questions, like:

- "What ARE our essentials and non-negotiables as we gather as a denominational gathering of the Body of Christ?"

- "Can we handle an abundance of manifestations of the Presbyterian family where congregations look, feel, and operate in drastically different ways?"

- And "Can we truly embrace the unknown, but yet joyfully strive to seek God's intentions?"

To check out the rest of Reyes-Chow's interesting and provocative blog entry, go here.

"One of the Most Powerfully Influential Religious Leaders in Today's World (and You Probably Don't Know His Name!)"

The above title for this entry on the "Road to Priesthood" blog is followed by the question "When you think of religious leaders who've helped bring social change to the 20th century, what name comes to mind?" The author suggests you probably thought of Gandhi, or Martin Luther King Jr. Close? How about Walter Rauschenbusch?

 "Who the heck is Walter Rauschenbusch," you ask? Well, only the pioneer of the Social Gospel Movement in the early 20th century, and a potential uniting figure for mainline Protestants and evangelicals. Not to mention the fact that Rauschenbusch's book Christianity and the Social Crisis helped inspire Gandhi, King, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Desmond Tutu.

Rauschenbusch's great-grandson, the Rev. Paul Rauschenbusch, spoke on the occasion of the book's 100th anniversary about the book, and his great-grandfather, for the New America Foundation. Check out the full video of the speech in which the younger Rauschenbusch talks about how the book continues to "challenge and inspire today's social justice thinkers" as well as how different Christian denominations can "find common ground in the understanding of our faith, melding the Evangelical church's traditional focus on the gospel with mainline church's focus on social justice."

To read more go here.

"'Father Oprah' Jumps Ship"

You may remember the story of Father Alberto Cutié, the Miami-based Catholic priest who a few months back was caught frolicking on the beach with an attractive woman. Not exactly sanctioned behaviour for a celibate.

What you may not have heard is that Father Cutié has since left the Catholic church, and is now a candidate for ordination in the Episcopal church. There are those who suggest this move to be a "scandalous breach of Christian unity," although on the flip side one may suggest it is, instead "a personal step toward health and wholeness." What do you think? Should Father Cutié's move be seen as a defection?

For more on this situation, and Father Cutié himself, read here.

"Unholy Business"

The history, and mystery, of the place we call the Holy Land fascinates many - whether they be believers in any particular faith or not. And the objects of history produced by that land (by way of archeology) are met with equal fascination.

It is our deep captivation with these objects and the potential connection they give us to our past (spiritual or otherwise), that creates an opportunity for forgers looking to exploit our yearning for that connection.

You may remember the famous forgery of the James Ossuary a few years back that was displayed at the Royal Ontario Museum. In her book Unholy Business: A True Tale of Faith, Greed and Forgery in the Holy Land, Nina Burleigh examines this fraud and others, and the big
business of biblical antiquities that produced them.

To read a full review of this book, take a look here.