Marginal Christianity

Our culture is often likened to whitewater rapids - ever-changing, unpredictable, dangerous. It would be hard to gainsay the analogy. Experienced rafters know the key rules for successfully negotiating the whitewater rapids. I suggest these rules give us some critical guidelines for navigating our cultural/social rapids. I've tried to translate them into biblical/theological guidelines for just such a purpose. The Nature and Purpose of Theology Theology is the work of the church that evaluates and directs its journey into and through the unpredictable and treacherous rapids. According to Karl Barth this means that theology -is contextual and conflictual : an instrument of the “ ecclesia militans” (Church Militant) , theology guides the Church of a specific time to address and/or contest the needs and hopes of that time. ( Church Dogmatics 1.2, 841) -is communal and missional : “...theology . . . can be put to work in all its elements only in the context of the ...

Matthew 1:18-25 18  Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah [ a ] took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19  Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. 20  But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21  She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” 22  All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: 23  “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,     and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.” 24  When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the...

          Thesis One : Everyone knows the church is in trouble in North America. Thesis Two : Change, significant change, is required. We all know that too. Thesis Three : That change needs to be thought all the way down (i.e. to the very structure, form, and theology of the identity and vocation of the church). Not all know this or want to know it. This failure dilutes or vitiates their efforts at change. These simple theses lie at the heart of the church’s struggle to cope with our changing culture without and the dysfunction within. However different the symptoms, churches genuinely searching for faithful responses to the world today, face the challenge of a complete and courageous rethink as sketched above. Nothing less will suffice. Such a rethink takes us back beyond the beginning of creation. There in the mystery of eternity past the triune God [1] – himself the fullness of love, fellowship, and community – determine...