The Church and the Crisis of Community -- Review
THECHURCH AND THE CRISIS OF COMMUNITY: A Practical Theology of Small-Group Ministry. By Theresa F. Latini. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company,
2011. Viii + 243.
It’s
no secret that there’s a crisis of community brewing. I expect that this crisis has been underway
for as long as I’ve been alive, and it shows no signs of ending any time
soon. Simply the time of Robert
Putnam’s book Bowling Alone offers us
a fairly succinct summation of our situation.
It’s not just that we’re no longer joiners, but we’re finding it ever
more difficult to create deep and abiding relationships with others. Although the church “should” be different,
reality suggests that it isn’t. There
have been any number of attempts at rectifying this reality, including the
embrace of small group ministries, but have these been successful? Or, are they simply another attempt at
developing church growth strategies? And
even if successful at building relationships, have these attempts simply
reinforced our tendency to join with those most like ourselves? That is, have our church-related small groups
simply become social clubs of the like-minded, and thus part of the problem?
Theresa
Latini, a Presbyterian minister and Associate Professor of Congregational and
Community Care Leadership at Luther Seminary in Minneapolis, seeks to address
this crisis of community and the ways in which the church has sought to address
it through the development of small groups.
The book under review offers a rather exhaustive analysis of the crisis of
community that has been burgeoning in our society. She also seeks to offer us a way of looking
at small groups through a theological lens that will help correct some of the
deficiencies present in the many small groups that exist in our local
churches. She brings to this discussion
a Reformed/Evangelical perspective that has been informed by her engagement
with the theology of Karl Barth.
This book is a revision
of Latini’s Princeton Ph.D. dissertation in Practical Theology, and as such it
is an academic treatise – much in the same vein as Tony Jones’ The Church Is Flat: The Relational Ecclesiology of the Emerging Church Movement
(Jopa Productions,
2011). If you’re looking for a brief
introduction to small group ministry or a how-to guide, this book is likely not
what you’re looking for. It is written
first and foremost for the academy, for theologically sophisticated
readers. You don’t need a M.Div. to read
it, but it wouldn’t hurt.
There are a number of
hints that this book emerged from a dissertation, that start with her
explication of her mentor’s description of four tasks of practical theology (descriptive-empirical,
interpretive, normative, and pragmatic) that one will go through in engaging
ministry/ecclesial issues. Using Richard
Osmer’s four tasks, she explores the way in which three practices interrelate
-- Divine practice, ecclesial practice, and societal practice. In this context small groups are the
ecclesial practice, which serves as the intersection where God’s work of
reconciliation (Divine practice) encounters “the yearning for community in the
United States (societal practice). Small
groups have been developed to respond to the crisis of community, but the
question is whether this has been an effective response.
She undertakes this task informed by a
Neo-Barthian practical theology. Having
read her book along with Tony Jones’s, I’m assuming that the Princeton Ph.D.
students in Practical Theology are asked to choose a theological vantage point
upon which to build their work (Jones uses Moltmann). An epilogue to the book provides a rationale
for this choice, while an appendix provides an introduction to her research
methodology.
The book begins with a
discussion of the current crisis of community in society and then moves on to
the role of small groups in responding to the crisis. She notes that the church has been the major
source of small groups, which include Sunday school classes, bible studies,
self-help groups, and special interest groups (e.g. political, advocacy, hobby,
book discussion). Not only has the
church been a major player in developing groups, but this move to small groups
has altered the structure and even the meaning of our ecclesial practices. Christian education and pastoral care, to
name two areas, have in many cases moved to small groups, with lay persons
taking increased roles in leadership.
There are both strengths and weaknesses in this move. For instance, she points out that while
persons might develop a deeper sense of faith, that faith may become more
subjective. They may re-embed social
ties, enabling people to become more connected to community where these ties
may not be very strong. There is another
area, which is understandable, but worrisome – that is the tendency toward
homogeneity in small groups. There is a
tendency for these groups to strengthen ties among those of like-mind or
background. Indeed, many, if not most,
of these groups are rooted in some form of affinity, whether socio-economic,
ethnicity, education, interests, gender, age – and there is a danger here that
it undermines a sense of connection across more diverse lines. This reality also tends to lead to avoiding
discussion of social issues.
Part of her work in
this project involved looking at specific small group programs, and she looked
at six congregations (either Reformed or Presbyterian) to see how they
organized their small groups. The six
ranged in size from 250 to 12 persons and included both urban and suburban
congregations. All of these
congregations worked at providing leadership training and even created the
materials for use in the groups – that is, these were for the most part highly
structured contexts.
This sociological
analysis is brought together with Karl Barth’s understanding of koinonia, which Latini notes, includes
not just fellowship, but such Barthian ideas as mutual indwelling,
participation, coinherence, and coexistence.
It is, she says, multi-dimensional, involving five interlocking
relationships – within the Trinity, within the person of the incarnate Christ
(divinity/humanity), between Christ and the Church, among church members, and
between church and the world. The Holy
Spirit serves as the “mediator of communion” in all five relationships, binding
together each of these relationships. The
question then becomes – how does this understanding of koinonia enable small groups to respond to the crisis of
community. She suggests that her
Barthian understanding of koinonia is
expressed in three modes – gathering, upbuilding, and sending. As to the first mode, her focus is on the
relationship with Christ, which is the foundation for koinonia. In the upbuilding
mode, the focus is on the relationships within the church, and finally the
sending mode looks to the koinonia with
the world. The role of small groups in
fostering the upbuilding relationships would seem self-evident, but what is key
is the role that small groups can play in fostering koinonia with the world. Her
hope is that small groups not only build community within the church but enable
connections with the world, meaning that these groups need to have openness to
those outside and see themselves as self-sufficient in themselves. As the book continues she explores the role
that small groups play in creating contexts for healing and offers strategies
for implementing small groups that can break out of the homogenizing tendencies
of so many small group ministries. This
is the pragmatic dimension of Osmer’s four tasks.
The goal in developing
this practical theology of small group ministry, with multidimensional koinonia as
the foundation, is the living into a
church that is “a countercultural, humanizing, missional community.” It is a community where “saints and sinners”
experience deep intimacy with one another crossing the traditional societal
boundaries, expressing the way of the cross.
She writes:
When small groups nurture generosity, compassion, and openness to the world and find creative ways to witness to God’s love in both word and deed, they help the church fulfill its vocation of participating in Christ’s ongoing ministry of reconciliation unto koinonia. Furthermore, when small groups practice multidimensional koinonia, they participate in God’s transformation of the crisis of community in late modernity (p. 180).
In other words, small group ministry is not simply
an end in itself with the goal to making the church grow. It is instead a key means through which God
engages in transforming the world. For
those of us who are exploring the call to be missional, this is a helpful and
hopeful resource.
If you’re looking for a
quick reading introduction to small group ministry or a how-to manual, you’ll
likely want to look elsewhere. This is
not light reading and it’s not a how-to manual.
It does offer some strategies for developing small group ministries, but
the focus here is on developing a sound theological rationale for small group
ministries that will address the crisis of community existing in the United
States. It is a reminder that the tendency
for small groups to become gatherings of like-minded folks so as to reinforce
their like-mindedness is not the Divine intention. With this trinity of modes of existence --
Gathering/Upbuilding/Sending – reflecting the koinonia that exists within the Trinity that is God, we are invited
to join with God in the work of transformation.
In developing this theology, Latini notes that Barth’s focus on divine
action needn’t preclude human participation.
As to the role that Barth’s theology plays in this book, one needn’t be
a full-fledged Barthian to make sense of the book or embrace its insights. She does a nice job of laying out principles
that can be accessed from a number of theological vantage points, but Barth’s
Trinitarian perspective offers a helpful foundation for her ideas.
So, if you’re looking
for a resource that will help you develop a solid theological foundation for
small group ministry, that seeks to move us away from subjective interiorism
toward an engagement with the world, then this book might be what you’re
looking for. If you’re interested in
developing a small group ministry that will keep small groups connected with the
broader congregation, support its mission, have a theological foundation, impact
the world outside the church, and embrace the kinds of diversity present in the
world, then Latini’s book will be of interest and value. Just remember that it began life as a
doctoral dissertation and thus some of the trimmings of such an endeavor remain
present in the book. If you take this
into consideration you will find a very thoughtful and useful expression of a
practical theology that is truly practical, missional, and needed at this moment in
time.
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