Around the "blog-o-sphere" this week there has been a lot of discussion regarding "the death of Emergent" or being "disappointed" with the movement. The posts have been very thoughtful, and the discussion lively. To me, this is a perfect example of what I love about the "emergent conversation" - I see this happening right in our midst.
However, I also thought that some of the words written this week might express the thoughts of members of our own cohort. Our cohort has grown, shrunk, gained and lost members, worked through changes and phases, and is something different today that perhaps we had envisioned months, or maybe even years ago.
So take a look at a few of the posts listed below, and perhaps comment about what resonated with you personally.
Tony Jones posts a "round up"
Response on EV.com from Jonathan Brink
The post by Nick Fiedler that got it started (discussing disappointments with Emergent)
A long (and brutally honest and informative) response from Tony Jones
Another good response from Makeesha Fisher
Christian Identity and the Hegemony of Mammon
2 years ago
Posts
2 comments:
Hey Jesse, I just wanted to say thank you for posting these articles. I read them and especially liked this from Jonathan Brink...
"Emergence isn’t a fad that requires me. It’s not something that I can control. It’s something I can only participate in. It’s happening whether I like it or not. It’s unwieldy and chaotic. It goes here when I want to go there. It makes me wait when I don’t want to, and calls me when I’m busy. Kind of like the Holy Spirit. And it is in these moments that my own intentions are questioned. And I don’t like that. Who does?"
I love with Jonathan's summary idea of Emergence. I will admit it's a little uncomfortable when no one posts on the blog and things get kind of quiet, but then I decide to simply reconnect in a different way and I am always grateful when I do.
I am wondering what kind of expectations people hold who are involved in the Emerging movement and start to feel disappointed. I can't help but wonder, since so many of the prominent voices are post-Evangelical, if they have been tempted to make comparisons to our own time and that of the Reformation, or some other supposedly transcendent period of Christian history. I say this because I know how often pop-references to Luther and the Great Awakening were made during my own Evangelical church experiences. Actually, I think Makeesha does something like this in her post. Something to keep in mind about post-modernism, which is one of the impetuses of the Emerging Conversation, is that it has a lot to say about history: namely that events in the past are not as streamlined as we make them out to be, and also that the notion of progress is not the de facto paradigm for the history of European civilizations. In other words, when you really look at the details, these past events that supposedly represent the most ideal Christian revolutions are always ragged and complicated. In the case of the Protestant Reformation, things were also pretty tragic. Emerging is actually going much better than this event, because so far it has caused no wars and I would venture to guess that no one has yet been forced to become "Emergent."
Also, I just saw some encouraging evidence that attests to how far the currents of Emergence have traveled. Recently I went with my mom to a hair appointment, and I saw that my mom's hairdresser, who lives in rural midwestern Missouri, had a copy of The Shack at her workstation. I know that this book is rather tame by Emergent standards, but given my preconceptions about the region this really amazed me. It's little things like this that make me think something powerful yet complicated is really going on, and not vocal anti-Emergents suddenly seeing the light.
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