Saying Yes, Saying No

I am in the process of reading the book From Nomads to Pilgrims, edited by Diana Butler Bass and Joseph Stewart-Sicking. This is the second volume of a trilogy of books by Bass dealing with the Practicing Congregations Project. I will be writing a review of the book for Sharing the Practice, the journal of the Academy of Parish Clergy (of which I'm the newly appointed editor). I'm almost done with the book, which is a collection of stories from congregations that exemplify the practices. You'll have to read this book and Diana's first book in this trilogy published by Alban Institute -- The Practicing Congregation: Imagining a New Old Church(2004) to find out more about what the practices are.

What caught my eye was the essay by Methodist Pastor Kenneth H. Carter, Jr.: "Saying Yes and Saying No: The Prayer of Jabez, The Passion of the Christ, and a Tale of Two Congregations." The point of the essay is how we deal as church with popular culture, and more specifically popular religious culture. As churches, especially mainline churches, we regularly come up against popular religious books/preachers whose message stands in contrast to our own. Carter contrasts Bruce Wilkinson's message of self-fulfillment (as seemingly found in this obscure biblical prayer) and John Wesley prayer that focuses on self-sacrifice and submission to the will of God. The second cultural phenomenon was The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson's macabre telling of the Good Friday story. Having seen the movie he chose to recommend his congregation not see it, but instead read the gospels.

The point that he struck home, though was that if we are to stand up to theologically deficient religious media (saying no) we must put in its place an alternative -- such as Wesley's prayer or the gospels. He warns us that we should not ignore such expressions of popular religious culture -- because word gets around and people in our congregations will be reading them. If we as pastors and teachers don't provide strong foundations, people will get their guidance elsewhere.

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