Church As Faith Community

I grew up in a United Church of Christ congregation in Glenside, PA, on the northern edge of Philadelphia.  It was a community of care and nurture, where people took the time and attention to get to know you.    I was active in the Sunday School and Youth ministry, and had a number of wonderful teachers and mentors.   The impact of their loving examples remains with me today.

It was at Glenside that I learned about Jesus and became immersed in the gospel.  As a teen, I began grappling seriously with what a life committed to the nonviolent agape love of Jesus might embody.  The Vietnam War was raging and I not only opposed it but was coming to a decision to resist being drafted.  There was great unrest in cities like Philly growing out of economic and social violence. Impacted by Jesus' presence among the poor and suffering, I was disturbed by what I perceived as the insulation of our northern suburb from brothers and sisters who were our neighbors.  I shared my reflections and experiences at church; my perspectives were not widely shared.  I became frustrated and, in retrospect, realize that others demonstrated more patience and understanding with me than I did with them. I left the church as an eighteen year old, grousing about hypocrisy.

A decade after leaving the Glenside Church, I made my way back into a faith community.  I had read an article in the Philadelphia paper about a city church that engaged in creative, dynamic worship and incarnational outreach. They became a sanctuary congregation for a Guatemalan family fleeing persecution.  The article was entitled, "The Oddball Church."  "That might be a place for me," I thought.  Within a year I began attending there, wanting to participate in the Sanctuary Movement.   What I discovered was that the church would be sanctuary for another refugee--me.  It was there that I was evangelized again, particularly by the refugee family themslves.  I recognized and acknowledged my call to ministry .  But before proceeding, I made my way home to Glenside.

The followers of Jesus at Glenside were overjoyed, and without hesitation made room for one more "hypocrite."  I marveled at how my own restlessness and sojourn as a teen had been stoked by the gospel I had been lovingly taught at Glenside Church and how, ten years later, some who didn't seem to share my deep commitment to nonviolence were teaching me some essential lessons about how it is practiced.

My memories this morning are spurred by Nancy's post on Monday and particularly by M Wms' important question in response:  " You say: "As mimetic theory teaches us, we know that the role of organized religion is to contain violence, which is not the same thing as bringing the peace that Jesus gives to us" and yet you mention that you are part of a Baptist faith community.  How do you reconcile these things?"

As I consider my own reponse to such a question, the distinction between "organized religion" and "faith community"   is a critically important one.  In the Acts of the Apostles, we witness a faith community emerging from the very midst of organized religion; the community is born and grows in the wake of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection, inspired by the Spirit.  In the new community, sacrificial mechanisms are interrupted, lives reclaimed, transformation experienced, an entire world beheld with new eyes.  At St. Andrew's Church, where I have pastored for the last twelve years, we work intentionally at being such a faith community.  It is an uneven road, to say the least, but I marvel at how the miracles of God are revealed in the everyday.  It is in our faith community that "the rubber hits the road,"  where the real living of the gospel gets "worked out."  If we are honest with ourselves, we know we contend daily with the bonds of religion but are at the same time being set free, in and through a new story that is claiming us.  I still get frustrated, as I did when I was eighteen; I experience my role in the ongoing story quite differently now.

In Violence Unveiled, Gil Bailie writes: "Perhaps the anthropological role of the Christian church in human history might be oversimplified as follows:  To undermine the structures of sacred violence by making it impossible to forget how Jesus died and to show the world how to live without such structures by making it impossible to forget how Jesus lived."  Several passages later he considers the example of Peter,saying:  "Peter's Aramaic name should serve as a perpetual reminder of the lingering lure of sacrificial thinking in Christian history, but it should not obscure the fact that the name means "rock" . . . The church, like Peter,is both a stumbling block and a cornerstone.  It is the latter only when it is consciously contrite for being,and having been, the former (pp. 274-275)."

I am deeply appreciative of Nancy's story about Anna. I too, have experienced a great deal of my ministry as being among those from outside the formal definitions of congregational life.   The community is much larger than it appears, and takes on beautiful new shape.  I continue to be evangelized by people I am "ministering to."  Distinctions diminish; accompanamiento is mutual.  And when the faith community is truly blessed, these folks come among us and offer a living Word of peace!

There is a great deal more that I would like to consider, but I am out of time (and a day late!).  I too, hope that people will continue to join us in dialogue, and share some of your own stories.  Shalom!

Scott Hutchinson

 

Comments

[nancy]

You describe the dilemma with some great imagery, Scott. That the stumbling block and the cornerstone are one/same is vitally important...it's living with the thing in one's home and trying to figure out how to respond to it that's the problem! Thanks for the reminder that at our best,even our own understanding is a process, not an end in itself. I'd like to hear more about how your current faith community keeps from devolving into organized religion. How do you keep that intention before you (plural)?

[Scott Hutchinson]

Nancy,
I will continue to reflect and write on these themes in coming weeks. I'm grateful when our entries and comments lead us into deeper conversation.

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