The 21st Century Church, Part Four: Re-Formation

Exactly 494 years ago today, an insolent monk in what we now call Germany nailed a notice to the door of a church. There were 95 things he was ticked off about and he listed off every one. One scathing indictment of the Roman Catholic Church after another. Martin Luther had guts (and he was probably a little stupid). At the time, the Church was the most powerful institution on Earth. Making it angry was likely to get you excommunicated or even executed. But Luther stood firm in his beliefs.

At the heart of his 95 theses about what was wrong about the Church were five key conclusions that Luther had gleaned from careful study of the Bible. The basis on which he challenged the Pope's monopoly on salvation now forms the foundation of modern Protestantism, something he never imagined or wanted.

Martin Luther believed that the road to being saved was very different from the path prescribed by the Church, encapsulated by his five core principles:

• The first was sola scriptura — by Scripture alone. The authority of God does not lie in any person, office, building, or institution, but only in the words of the Bible.

• The second was sola fide — by faith alone. You can't buy your way into Heaven (despite what Pope Leo X would've told you). God has no use for money and does not require good works. You get in on your faith, in a transaction that skips the middleman (Rome) entirely.

• The third was sola gratia — by grace alone. This one is my favorite. No one forgives sins but God himself (of course God is beyond gender, but that's another blog) and nothing we do can make us worthy of this forgiveness. The good news is we don't have to do anything. God is merciful and gives us his forgiveness as a free gift.

• The fourth was solus Christus — by Christ alone. This is gift of grace is given through God's son, who died so that we might live. That's how great his love is for us.

• The fifth was soli Deo gloria — glory to God alone. I imagine this one really angered Luther. In his day, the Church held all the power and influence in Europe and was in the process of violently converting the native peoples of Central and South America. The Pope lived opulently. The glory was to the Church...and if there was any left over, God could have that.

It has been 500 years since Martin Luther took his historic stand against the Church. A Protestant branch of Christianity swept the globe, inspired by his theology. A whole new church was named after him. The Catholic Church survived and thrived. It, too, was reformed by the Reformation. Martin Luther became a mythic figure, a champion of intellectual and philosophical rebellion and one of the first men in history to assert his individuality against the hegemonic ideology of his time.

In 1517, Luther saw that the Church was broken and he sought to give it form again. In 2011, our church is also broken. People are leaving in droves. Our stance on social justice issues is largely limited to words and resolutions, but lacks any real action. The stances themselves are deliberately vague to keep from alienating a diverse base of financial support that covers the entire political spectrum. We have trouble practicing what we preach and we get so caught up in the trappings of modern Christianity that we ignore or forget about the meat of our beliefs. We don't question. We don't debate. We don't grow in our faith through serious reflection and discussion. We are stagnant, without form.

We need to re-form our church. We need to give it life again, the same way Martin Luther did. We need the courage to say that the institution is wrong. We need to take a good, hard look at the scriptures and remind ourselves of what we believe. The time has come — time for a new Reformation.

Why this Christian-in-Progress Supports Gay Marriage

Photo by Jonny Eberle.

Arnold: "I don't know what to say to you. I really don't. I'm not trying to throw it in your face but it is what I am and it's not just a matter of who I sleep with. Ma, try to imagine the world the other way around. Imagine that every movie, book, magazine, T.V. show, newspaper, commercial, billboard told you that you should be homosexual. But you know you're not and you know that for you this is right..."


Ma: "Arnold, stop already. You're talking crazy."


Arnold: "You want to know what's crazy? That after all these years, I'm still sitting here justifying my life. That's what's crazy."


Ma: " You call this a life? This is a sickness! But this is what you've chosen for yourself."


Arnold: "Ma, look: I'm gay. I don't know why. I don't think anyone does. But that's what I am. For as far back as I can remember. Back before I knew it was different or wrong..."

- Torch Song Trilogy by Harvey Fierstein

Last month, the New York State Legislature passed the Marriage Equality Act, making New York the largest state in the country to legalize same-sex marriage. When I heard the news, I remember feeling pride — pride in the fact that we were finally taking steps toward a more loving and accepting future.

Some people are surprised to hear that I support gay marriage and go to church. Personally, I don't see why the two have to be mutually exclusive. The God I believe in is a loving God, who loves everyone, not just straight people. The God I believe in makes no exceptions and any interpretation that casts him as a father who doesn't love all of his children and would condemn some of them because of how he created them just feels wrong.

In 1st Corinthians 13:13, Paul writes to the church in Corinth, "And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love."In the gospels, Jesus says the same thing, telling an expert in the law, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself'" (Matthew 22:37-39).

Love your neighbor as yourself. That's what it all comes down to. Loving our neighbors — all of our neighbors — and God makes no distinction between people like us and people who are different. In his day, Jesus was criticized because he associated with the unclean members of Jewish society. He ate with tax collectors and went around healing lepers.

I am convinced that if Jesus was here today, you would not find him in the pews of our churches. You would find him among the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer community. Why? Because Jesus does not side with public opinion or authority. He sides with the people society and the church condemn. Not to convert them. Not to "save" them, because there is nothing wrong with them. He goes there to show them that God loves them unconditionally, just as they are. If we want to call ourselves Christians — followers of Jesus Christ — we would do well to follow his example.

Yet, people still hate. Christians in particular often denounce homosexuality as a sin. When I hear this hateful rhetoric, I am ashamed to be connected to an organization that can be so blinded by dogma that it forgets its founding ideals. If we took a step back and saw the hurt anti-gay sentiment has on real people, we would be disgusted by ourselves.

Arnold: "Listen, Ma, you had it easy. You have thirty-five years to remember, I have five. You had your children and friends to comfort you, I had me! My friends didn't want to hear about it. They said, 'What're you gripin' about? At least you had a lover.' 'Cause everybody knows that queers don't love. How dare I? You had it easy, Ma. You lost your husband in a nice clean hospital, I lost mine out there. They killed him there on the street. Twenty-three years old laying dead on the street. Killed by a bunch of kids with baseball bats. Children. Children taught by people like you. 'Cause everybody knows that queers don't matter! Queers don't love! And those that do deserve what they get!"

I hope that one day, this won't even be an issue. I pray that my children will ask me about the gay marriage battle and ask, "Dad, what was that all about?" because they won't understand what the big deal was. Someone has to take a stand. As Christians-in-progress, I think we're called to stand with those who are told that everything they are is wrong and that they need to be "cured."

Jesus loved everyone. Why can't we?

Defining a New Christianity

Tonight, I went dancing with a few friends at a local bar. While the jazz band was taking a break, we sat at our table and sipped water. One of my friends, an atheist, asked me what I was doing this weekend, to which I replied that I was going to Wisconsin. I didn't immediately say why, so she probed. Finally, I admitted quietly that I was going to help plan a youth gathering. I said it quickly, almost under my breath. I wasn't ashamed of my involvement...or was I?

When you ask me what I am, I will often reply that I'm a writer or a filmmaker or a student or Albino Black Irish. I make it a point not to introduce myself as a Christian, though. In fact, most of my friends go years before they find out I go to church. But why all the subterfuge?

The moniker "Christian" once meant rebel. It identified you as a a committed follower of the teachings of Jesus Christ. Today, "Christian" means collaborator, bigot, or ignorant. So, what changed? Did Jesus' message change? Or did we change?

The church is broken. Centuries of brutality and bureaucracy has transformed a few pockets of zealous free-thinkers into a monstrous organization that, in many ways, ignores its founding principles. The public by and large sees Christians as backward, intolerant hypocrites and the reputation is well-earned. When I tell someone I am a Christian, I risk losing my credibility and their respect. That is a tragedy.

Today, there is no blood, but people in pews have fallen into a safe routine where they are called upon to do nothing more than sit, stand, sing, and put money in the offering plate. There has got to be more to it than that.

I shouldn't have to be ashamed because I believe. I dream of a new Christianity that gets back to the root of what it all means. Loving our neighbor (all of our neighbors). Caring for the sick and the needy.

There are needy people among us. Not just on the streets, but in the sanctuaries. There are people in need of a new, more spiritually-fulfilling Christianity — a Christianity that is not afraid to get its hands dirty to do what is right; a Christianity that doesn't fear questions or dissenting viewpoints. The church of the future should show the world that it practices what it preaches.

I am not a Christian. I am a Christian-in-progress — a flawed human being who wants to follow Jesus' example, who wants to be a good man, but struggles to get there. The church, while broken in many ways, is also a work-in-progress, but there is hope. We may have strayed, but our shepherd will guide us to greener pastures. We are saved by grace, even from ourselves.

The 21st Century Church, Part Two: Passion & Compassion

I heard somewhere that people have been using the word "church" incorrectly for centuries. "Church" has come to used as a noun — a word for the building, and occasionally applied to the people who gather inside its protective walls. However, "church" takes on a different meaning when you use it as a verb instead. The verb "chuch" becomes a action or a behavior — an experience instead of the physical bricks and mortar.

That's the kind of church that I long for. Nowhere in the Bible can I find the place where Jesus commanded his disciples to go build a bunch of cathedrals. So often, we "go to church," meaning that we go to a building that houses our entire religious experience. What a mundane way to experience faith. If we limit it to just the confines of four walls for one hour, one day a week, then we have completely missed the point.

This is yet another reason why I think the (noun) Church is struggling. There's very little satisfaction in such a shallow experience. In Acts 2:42-47, we get a very different sense of the experience of being church: "They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles. All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds^* to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home^* and ate their food with glad and generous^* hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved."^44454647

That is what our experience could be — a dynamic church of devotion to teaching, fellowship, and community. An experience that combines passion for scripture and contemplation with a deep passion for outreach and goodwill. We, too, could praise God with glad and generous hearts, but to do so, we need to open the doors of our exclusive cliques. We have to leave the building and show compassion for our neighbors with the passion and zeal of the disciples gathered at Pentecost.

Some denominations are better at this than others (though now is not the time or place to be drawing those distinctions) and that is why I believe it is vitally necessary that a new, emerging branch of Christianity embrace the qualities of many diverse groups.

A 21st century Christianity should combine passion for God with compassion for those in need. Only then will it be relevant in our postmodern world.