Snippet: Unbundling

Snip·pet | ˈsnipit | noun a small piece or brief extract.

Here’s one from Skye Jethani talking about a kind of faith “deconstruction” that can be healthy (on the Holy Post Podcast, Episode 497):

“I think there are people raised in, let’s say, white, suburban, evangelical Christianity for whom Christianity was bundled with certain cultural and political values and they’re realizing, ‘Now, wait a minute, they don’t have to be bundled together.’ You can still hold on to faith in Christ and express your politics this way or some cultural issues that way.”

I would add that is also true for a black or Hispanic urban Christian for whom Christianity has been bundled with certain cultural and political values. Or an African rural… You get the point.

I really find this term and idea helpful. If you study church history you see some seriously crazy bundling, but it’s much harder to see how we do it as well.

And some of the voices I’ve appreciated throughout my life are those that help us see where we’ve bundled faith in Jesus with a particular political perspective or denomination or theological tradition.

I’m not saying we can’t prefer a particular political approach or denomination or theological tradition. They just can’t be welded or inextricably bundled to the faith.

Photo by Max LaRochelle on Unsplash

Snippet: Moments that Form and Shape Who We Are

Snip·pet | ˈsnipit | noun a small piece or brief extract.

A friend recently sent me a NTTimes column by Tish Harrison Warren on why churches should stop streaming services. I don’t agree with that part of the article (although I resonate with her intent). But what she says about the importance of in-person, embodied worship is so thought-provoking on many fronts:

“‘Christians need to hear the babies crying in church. They need to see the reddened eyes of a friend across the aisle,’ Collin Hansen wrote in his Times essay about online church. ‘They need to chat with the recovering drug addict who shows up early but still sits in the back row. They need to taste the bread and wine. They need to feel the choir crescendo toward the assurance of hope in what our senses can’t yet perceive.’ These are not mere accessories to a certain kind of worship experience. These moments form and shape who we are and what we believe.”

That suggests a theory about why some haven’t yet returned to in-person: they weren’t experiencing those kinds of interactions when they came to in-person. Their in-person experience wasn’t that different than their online experience (or their experience of missing worship altogether).

As a pastor, I get to interact with people on the weekend at a level most miss out on. I get that.

But I know many non-pastors in our church who experience what Warren describes almost every week because they are either bringing the hurting person, or they’re on the lookout for someone they don’t recognize and are willing to start a conversation (much easier for “outgoing” people), or they’re involved in ministries that facilitate real conversations with people in diverse circumstances (which, by the way, is a great way for “shy” people to have some of those kinds of interactions, too).

But I can’t help but wonder if how we do church these days makes it harder than it should be, and whether we need to change in drastic ways.

Not a new thought, but one that I’m thankful people like Warren and Hansen are keeping at the forefront of my mind.

Photo by Tim Kilby on Unsplash