What is church?

It was Tertullian in his Apologetics that coined a phrase widely cited by Pro-Life campaigners: "He is a man, who is to be a man; the fruit is always present in the seed." Perhaps the same reasoning can be applied to the currently controversial question of what constitutes 'church'. 'Church to be is church', perhaps? Church planter, Stuart Murray Williams summarises the options in 'Planting Churches', p.128. There are different moments at which a church may be said to begin, depending on our theological convictions - perhaps when the church has been commissioned, when it begins to meet in a public place or when the core elements of mission, worship and community are present? In animals conception may be understood as a sperm fusing with an ovum in the uterus, to form an embryo. By analogy church is fully 'church' from the moment it is implanted in situ. This is not to say - again by analogy - that the new church doesn't have a great deal of maturing to do.

Of course an argument from analogy should be treated with some caution. If Matt 5:27,28 asserts a kind of equivalance between committing adultery and thinking about it does it then follow (by analogy) that merely planning a new church is in itself 'church' - a kind of 'church of the mind'? In my view such a disembodied notion of 'church' is a step too far, although similar issues are raised by the existence of internet 'churches'. Arguments from analogy are hardly likely to take the heat out of the 'what is church' debate. When a person becomes a person is more fiercely controversial, even than the question of what constitutes a Christian church. I would tentatively suggest however, that worries about the need for 'proper' ministry and sacraments in newly planted congregations may be more to do with the insecurities of established churches than whether two or three gathered in the name of Christ are an infant church or something else.

Mennonites in Liverpool?

As far as I know there are only two Mennonite Churches in Britain: at Wood Green in London and a Portugese speaking congregation in Eastbourne. However, for years now I've been hearing tales of an African Mennonite fellowship in Liverpool. Is this one of those myths like the Yeti or the Loch Ness Monster or is there some truth to the rumour? If there are Mennonites in Liverpool it would be appropriate. The last time Menno's folk passed through the port in any numbers was on their way to North America from Russia more than a hundred years ago. If you've heard anything about the Liverpool connection I would love to hear from you.

Anger with the church

Over the years I've been to a lot of conferences. One of the best was an event in Leeds led by the Iona Community. I remember a session entitled 'Anger with the Church' - easily the best attended workshop of the day. Yesterday I had lunch with a friend which brought that workshop to mind. Normally phlegmatic and affable, he was struggling to keep his anger under control. The management of the organization he works for has changed direction, calling into question his leadership and bringing his employment to an end. I don't know enough of the detail to say more but I felt for my friend and his family. The organization could have done better, especially one supposedly committed to peace and a transforming conflict. To be honest, my lunchtime meeting also brought up bitter personal experiences.

I enjoy reading Thomas Merton but wonder whether it's revealing that arguably the most famous Christian monk of the 20th Century ended up in a hermitage. I believe in Christian Community but recognize why so many believers end up refugees from corporate Christian commitment. Christian organizations - sometimes rather dismissively called para-church organizations - generate similar outcomes. There are many reasons for this but here's a few that occur to me:

1) Dressing up power as something else. All organizations involve the exercise of power but it's sometimes seen as too 'unspiritual' a word for Christians to acknowledge. Sometimes too, there's a reluctance to admit to hidden agendas and vested interests. This isn't honest and it gets in the way of transparency and accountability in decision-making.
2) Failures in communication. It sounds basic but a good deal of pain could be avoided by ensuring that we actually talk to one another. This is about listening to other points of view but it's also about ensuring that processes (for example disciplinary processes) don't lock people out of the conversation. Excessive secrecy is the kiss of death for good corporate process.
3) Recognizing the impact of decline. Decline obviously has an impact on numbers but it's also deeply discouraging. That discouragement can lead to fatalism and deepen exhaustion amongst deeply committed staff and volunteers. It's all too easy for churches and Christian organizations to cast around for scapegoats - especially leaders - who are probably already overworked.

I would be glad of a conversation about this. Why was that 'anger with the church' workshop so well attended?

Can you see the Join?

'Crisis' is an over-used word but if any generation has a right to use it, ours has. There's the ecological crisis, the economic crisis, a crisis of cultural confidence at the heart of what's been called 'Postmodernity' not to mention that other 'post' word, 'Post-Christendom' that threatens to sweep away body and soul of Western Christianity.

Neither do these 21st Century horsemen of the apocalypse ride alone - they overlap and intermingle appallingly. It is a tragedy of global significance that just as the world desperately needs Christians to fight for ecological sanity, churches in the most culpable nations (the heavy carbon emitters) are focused on recriminations and institutional survival. Even worse, just as the world needs to act with unified purpose along comes Postmodernity - and Postmodernity doesn't do 'unity'. Further, could anything be more distracting than the global downturn - are we fiddling whilst forests burn, tempers and temperatures rise and the oceans turn to acid? Of course 'connectedness' can work for good as well. All this talk of 'emerging churches' or 'fresh expressions' isn't only about ticking the Postmodern boxes but a statement of faith that churches will rediscover the power and fullness of mission - mission dei - God's passion for the healing of a broken Creation.

Bienenberg Declaration

Following on from the previous post here is one attempt to outline the characteristics of a 'peace church':


5 Characteristics of a Peace Church
What Characterises a Peace Church? - Bienenberg Declaration
Christians of many churches and communities gathered at the Bienenberg near Basel (Switzerland) from 28-30 May 1999 to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the Church and Peace movement. They met in a time of severe crises and wars in various parts of the world, in particular the shocking bombing of Yugoslavia by NATO and expelling of many inhabitants of Kosovo by Yugoslavia. This was the context which gave birth to the following declaration.

As disciples of Jesus, we are learning what it means to live as peace churches. We have found this both challenging and enriching, and we invite other Christians to share in this life and vision. In our experience, peace churches have five characteristics:

1. Proclamation of the gospel of peace.
We announce God’s good news of reconciliation and peace (2 Cor. 5:19) through Jesus Christ who is our peace (Eph. 2:14). We have received this freely, as God’s gift. We ourselves are needy people, and we offer this good news without condition to all needy people, including those who feel themselves marginalized and disadvantaged (Mark 2:17).

2. Love of all human beings - even the enemy
We have learned through Jesus Christ to love our enemies and to pray for them (Mt. 5:44), even when we are called to resist nonviolently their unjust actions. We were God’s enemies (Rom. 5:8) and remain complicit in a sinful world, but Christ has reconciled us to God and to one another, and has invited us to seek reconciliation with all people. We want to build bridges of understanding and peace to those whom we and our nations call enemies.

3. Rejection of violence
Therefore we are learning first to recognize and reject our own violence. We refuse to use violence personally or to justify the use of violence as an instrument of power whether on a family, societal, national or international level. We seek to learn and to practice the skills and disciplines of nonviolent conflict transformation, and to train others in these.

4. Commitment to the victims of violence
We are determined to not close our eyes to the horrific sacrifices which violence requires. As Jesus in his time stood with the victims of oppression and violence, so we are committed to standing with today’s victims. We seek to be reliable partners of the oppressed even in situations of great danger.

5. Community and solidarity
To realize this vision, we need each other, in our own congregations and communities, and in solidarity with other Christians around the world. Our citizenship is in ‘heaven’ (Phil. 3:20), and we are the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27). Therefore all ties to nationality, ethnicity and land - important though these are - have been relativized. We seek to be a social expression of God’s new world, alternative societies in whose climate justice, peace, mercy and truth will flourish. We invite others to share this vision with us and to discover its reality in their own congregations and communities.

18 June 99


This declaration originates with Church and Peace, whose interesting website (http://www.church-and-peace.org/index.php) contains network details, events and resources.

Amish in the UK?

It's a busy time for possibilities - official and freelance. Have a peek inside my inbox: there's a 'walking church' (Walkabout); an iniative around 'Christian Practices like hospitality and almsgiving called 'Praxical'; a South Oxfordshire Nightstop development; an Anabaptist exhibition and new work with Ekklesia.

But you're going to think I've gone totally crazy with the last one. The Anabaptist Tradition was cut short in Britain through 16th Century persecution. Although influential, since then it's largely been an underground movement. Gradually the pace of development has gathered pace since the mid 20th Century following the arrival of the Bruderhof in 1937, Mennonites in 1940 and the Anabaptist Network in 1992. Today however, despite the growth of Anabaptist related organisations under the umbrella of the Root and Branch Network, there are still only two Mennonite congregations (to my knowledge) and a handful other churches with a Radical Reformation influence. In Post-Christendom UK surely the time has arrived to see what a British Anabaptist church might look like. But alongside this I want to see something crazy and marvellous happen - invite the Amish to Britain.

Today we aren't used to seeing Amish buggies trotting down Oxfordshire lanes or Rumspringa in Rufford but why not? Amish communities in the United States and Canada have gradually diversified away from farming, driven by the lack of availability of affordable land. Now, I know UK land prices aren't cheap but agriculture in Britain is in decline. The total farming labour force of 534,000 is down 80,000 on a decade earlier. At the present time I'm still doing the research, but could this be an Amish shaped space? Whatever the hurdles (and they are large) this idea might not be crazy after all.

Two Cheers for Chaplaincy

One or two of my recent blog entries seem to have started in an awkward conversation. That might be something to do with my own brand of prickly peacemaking or just a coincidence. My conversation partner on this occasion was an ex-services Baptist prison chaplain. The 'prickly' part centred on my reaction to the relationship between his church and the local R.A.F. base - either 'close' or 'cosy' depending on your point of view. The awkward part was to do with how much I like the chaplain in question - an altogether brilliant bloke!

I felt bad afterwards for blurting out my opinion with little sensitivity. But I still ended up thinking about 'chaplaincy', especially in the Armed Services. Many chaplains no doubt do a fine job but I remain deeply uneasy with a role which is not only pastoral but gives legitimacy the institution itself. Some of the same issues are also raised by pastoral care, church membership and church planting as well as chaplaincy. I am thinking about Armed Services chaplaincy but some of the same issues are raised by chaplaincy in other contexts: the sex industry, prisons, multi-national corporations, financial institutions or cruise ships. Does a chaplain to large multi-national company ratify all the activities or that organisation? How would a cruise ship chaplain best approach a largely wealthy and highly mobile constituency? How does a chaplain in the finance industry deal with opposition to usury in the early church? Can a chaplain working with prostitutes retain trust whilst also criticising the sex industry itself? To be fair on chaplains, the freedom to raise awkward issues has as much to do with the willingness of an institution to stomach criticism as it does to the convictions of the chaplain.

An army chaplain doesn't fire the rifle or order the soldier to fire but surely the presence of chaplains in an institution wedded to the use of lethal force underpins both actions. In some cases an entire national church is conscripted into a chaplaincy role, as is the case of the Church of England on State occasions. It is enough the make the Prince of Peace weep yet, I cannot bring myself to write off millions of people (and their families) who serve in armed forces around world, whether willingly or not. If the Incarnation is to mean anything then surely we should not ask 'is Christ be present?' but rather 'how is Christ present?'. The participation of many courageous women and men in Civilian Peacemaker Teams points in the right direction - to an engaged and active peacemaking which is incarnate but still refuses legitimacy to violence.

Planting a Peace Church

I wrote an article once under the title of "The higher the hurdles, the fewer the runners". It's so long ago now that I can't remember the details. One detail I do remember is that it was about 'Peace Churches' and why there are so few of them. There's probably a better definition out there but when I think of 'Peace Church' I have in mind unequivocal pacifism and creative, active peacemaking. Perhaps the scarcity of these churches - Quakers excepted - is to do with the quirks of UK church history (e.g. the removal of Anabaptism) or the radical call to discipleship in an age that thumbs its' nose at commitment. It's a reminder that however much we seek contextualization in Postmodernity there will always be areas where relevance means discerning the flow and heading deliberately in the other direction.

For individuals the lack of shalom churches makes for difficult choices, especially if the liberalism of the British Society of Friends isn't appealing. I confess that too often I have called for 'them' to plant peace churches and constituted myself as a spectator. Perhaps too, Christian pacifists have been too polite, even too peaceable to insist on peace. So, I suppose you could visualise me flying a flag (not the nationalist kind of course) or writing a kind of 'lonely hearts ad'' in this little blog entry: '... desperately seeking peaceniks' perhaps?

Bitter and Twisted?

It was one of those conversations I regularly have with Anglicans - the sort that begin with polite conversation about Amish quilts and end with me ranting on about clericalism and an awkward silence. The last of these conversations, with a friendly, trendy, priestly, monkish kind of Anglican, led to him dropping the phrase 'bitter and twisted' into the conversation. It wasn't overtly aimed at me but my anticlerical radar is tuned to a pretty high setting. I confess to a twinge of irritation - that he was less interested in engaging with the point than undermining the messenger. So, is this anticlericalism thing an obsession? Certainly. Am I 'bitter and twisted'? Maybe. That's something for prayer and healing. Will that change my views? I doubt it.