Categories: uncategorized
Date: 04 May 2008 16:46:07
I've been off exploring new monasticism, in Coventry. Yesterday was spent at an event being run by the Anabaptist Network and the Northumbria Community . Other groups like Urban Expression and Inner Change were also tied into this mix somewhere along the line and so it was an interesting line up.
It was a wired, but wonderful weekend. I got to surprise Surfing Madness -vbf - who had no idea I was going and I got spiritually nourished and challenged in equal measure. (I also got time to stop and read Douglas Coupland's Gum Thief on the train which was cool).
Highlights:
Being able to share fellowship and just hang out with some truly amazing people.
Beginning to learn about the Anabaptist tradition. I so need to learn more about this as it seems it might just be the tradition which explains how you can be evangelical but also radical in your approach to living out everyday life and faith as a Christian.
Hearing about how God is building part of his church as a social movement (somebody so needs to look at social movement theory from an ecclesiological perspective). There are lots of ickle groups moving in the same direction. The groups seem to share 12 basic characteristics, according to an American New Monasticism website which Pete Askew was quoting:
1) Relocation to the abandoned places of Empire.
2) Sharing economic resources with fellow community members and the needy among us.
3) Hospitality to the stranger
4) Lament for racial divisions within the church and our communities combined with the active pursuit of a just reconciliation.
5) Humble submission to Christ's body, the church.
6) Intentional formation in the way of Christ and the rule of the community along the lines of the old novitiate.
7) Nurturing common life among members of intentional community.
8) Support for celibate singles alongside monogamous married couples and their children. (**see lowlights for my issues with this one**)
9) Geographical proximity to community members who share a common rule of life.
10) Care for the plot of God's earth given to us along with support of our local economies.
11) Peacemaking in the midst of violence and conflict resolution within communities along the lines of Matthew 18.
12) Commitment to a disciplined contemplative life.
Lowlights:
The fact the language & main sessions were so bloke centred. Terms like "New Monking" and "New Friaring" are not helpful. There may be a strong case for "old language" to use such language. However, terms originating in the current millenium should surely be more gender neutral, if they are intended to apply to both men and women.
Does new monasticism and by extension much of the emerging / emergent church, (I can never remember the distinctions between the different varieties of e/E), have no women to offer as platform speakers? It's dispiriting when the authority and power still appears to rest exclusively in the hands of a small number of white, middle aged men. This was most apparent during a practioners panel discussion. However, it does have to be said that Brother Samuel, Stuart Murray Williams and Roy Searle all rocked yesterday.
Now back to the twelve points, and point eight which says: "Support for celibate singles alongside monogamous married couples and their children." Don't get me wrong I think celibacy is a good thing (if it is a genuine choice), and married couples with or without children are important, but as it stands that point excludes an awful lot of people and is at best badly worded. At worst it is a sign of how what I picked up was seeking to be a real third millenium movement just doesn't get modern life because they are constrained by modernist Christian views of family and sexuality and are seeking to perpetuate a religious practice which has been exclusive rather than inclusive. Perhaps a more appropriate wording would have been "To give mutual support to all whatever their household shape".
Also issue with it all being so northern hemisphere centred. I want to know what is happening in the South aswell.
No prizes for guessing I did getting politely awkward about some of the above points in the question times. However, all in all though an excellent conference and in the mist of life's current madness just what I needed.