The Pragmatic Jesus and Institution v. Community

I don't check this blog frequently, but when I did today it was rather to my surprise that I discovered that there's a proper colloquy underway here! I couldn't resist contributing a couple odd thoughts and friendly concerns.

I have read Carnegie's book, but I harbor some reservations about a straightforward application of his flexible brand of amiable pragmatism to the practices proper to the life of the Church seeking reconciliation. I feel as if Jesus and Paul and the early Fathers and Mothers of the Church simply didn't always interact with others in ways recognizably consistent with these principles. Jesus wasn't really one to try to get the best of arguments by avoiding them: he often dove straight in! And in the midst of those arguments, he disclosed the Father's grace, love, mercy, and justice to those around him.

Paul really wasn't too good at always showing respect for other people's opinions and never saying, "You're wrong." The start of Galatians 3 comes to mind: "You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you?" Or earlier in the same epistle, "I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel." When the Good News of the Kingdom was at stake, neither Paul nor Jesus was afraid to rebuke, correct, and just generally be in the faces of those they loved.

My point in saying this is not to discredit the ideas of Carnegie: I think that there are some very helpful pointer that he offers: it's probably hard to go wrong by sympathizing with other people's ideas and desires. Further, I think that as disciples, we in the church could probably do a better job of practicing genuine hospitality toward others.

Nevertheless, I do think that sometimes the practices proper to the reconciling Church can demand arguments, judgment-in-love, confrontation, and other prickly modes of interaction with each other. Relationships are important. So important, in fact, that they sometimes demand extreme measures to maintain them.

I think that perhaps just such extreme measures are sometimes called for in seeking to respond to the problem that Emmet sketches. The divisiveness imported into the church by self-acclaimed 'grass-roots,' 'para-church,' or 'post-institutional' Christian groups must be challenged by calling those folks to genuine community with those who are supposedly 'stuck' in 'archaic, ineffective' institutional churches. They depend on them. And only as that dependence is articulated in concrete modes of fellowship will the Body be drawn together in love.