Posted on 05/17/2004 7:06:39 AM PDT by qam1
VIEW MEGACHURCHES AS SLICK, IMPERSONAL
For evidence of generational upheaval these days, you might skip over the usual suspects -- sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll -- and consider instead Christianity.
Two decades after baby boomers invented the suburban megachurch, which removed crosses or stained-glass images of Jesus in favor of neutral environments, their children are now wearing "Jesus Is My Homeboy" T-shirts.
As mainline churches scramble to retain young people, these worshippers have gained attention by-creating alternative churches in coffee bars and warehouses and publishing new magazines and Bibles that come on as anything but church.
But does a T-shirt really serve the faith? And if religion is our link to the timeless, what does it mean that young Christians replace their parents' practices?
The movement "has a noble side," said Michael Novak, the conservative theologian at the American Enterprise Institute. He remembers how much he enjoyed the Christian comic books of his youth. He compared the alt-evangelicals to missionaries, who "feel they've learned something valuable from their faith and want to share it" using the native language.
For many in this generation, the worship style of their parents feels impersonal: not bigger than their daily, media-intensified lives, but smaller. Their search is for unfiltered religious ex-perience.
"My generation is discontented with dead religion," said Cameron Strang, 28, founder of Relevant Media, which produces Christian books, a Web site and Relevant magazine, a stylish 70,000-circulation bimonthly that addresses topics like body piercing, celibacy, extreme prayer, punk rock and God.
Strang, a graduate of Oral Roberts University, is in some ways a model alt-evangelical, with two earrings, a shaved head and beard. He left a megachurch, he said, because he felt no community at the slick services. Now he attends an alternative church in a school gym, with intimate groups and basketball after services.
This stylistic shift is critical, said Lee Rabe, pastor at Threads, an alternative, or "emerging," church in Kalamazoo, Mich. Where megachurches reached out to baby boomers turned off by church, the younger generation often has no experience with religion. They need to be beguiled, not assuaged, Rabe said.
"The deity-free 'church lite' of the megachurches, that's the last thing these people want," he said. "They want to talk about God. It's hard-core, not in a fire and brimstone way, but it has to be raw, real."
The changes are often more stylistic than doctrinal. Many alt-evangelicals espouse conservative theology, but reject the censure of some churches. Strang sees this as a blueprint for an evangelical left.
"We're all sinners," he said. "Your sin isn't any worse than my sin. We don't say, 'Stop the horrible gays.' You want to reach them, you don't want to protest them. If we looked like goody-two-shoes, clean cut, we couldn't have a conversation with our lesbian friend at the coffee shop, because she couldn't relate."
Increasingly, this conversation borrows from pop culture, in the same way that hip secular culture borrows the cabala and the cross.
Critics say this engagement comes at a price. Timothy Williams, 48, a pastor at Sound Doctrine Ministries, a non-denominational church in Enumclaw, Wash., sees flirtation with pop culture as a capitulation to sin. "More and more, the church is seeking to be like the world around it," said Williams, who has written a pamphlet denouncing Christian rock. "But the Bible says that anyone who becomes a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. If we're going to be relevant or on the world's level to draw people, we might as well give free beer in the parking lot."
But evangelicals have long used pop culture and new technology to spread their gospel, said Stephen Prothero, chairman of the religion department at Boston University.
Christian tracts handed out in the 19th century were one of the first mass media. In the 1930s, the evangelist Charles Fuller used the new medium of radio to broadcast his sermons. Four decades later, the Jesus movement of the 1970s adopted the vibe of the 1960s counterculture.
The actor Stephen Baldwin, a born-again Christian, has just directed a DVD called Livin' It, pairing extreme sports with faith testimony, from which he hopes to spin skate Bibles, clothing, CDs and Bible-study guides, all tied to a non-profit youth ministry.
"This could be the first get-down rock 'n' roll, cool Christian brand," he said.
The underlying romance is familiar from any Nirvana video: the Christian as rebel or outsider, misunderstood, struggling against a world of conformity, commercialism and manufactured pleasures.
"It's a countercultural thing," said Tim Lucas, 33, pastor of an emerging ministry called Liquid in Basking Ridge, N.J. On a recent Sunday, Lucas wore a Hawaiian shirt and used images from The Lord of the Rings movies and a clip from Amadeus in a sermon about the book of First Samuel.
"They identify with being an underground movement, which is what Christianity was in the beginning," Lucas said of his congregation. "Living out a life with Christ at the center draws a lot of flak. Not a lot of people will celebrate that."
The movement away from middle-of-the-road theology and worship mirrors a trend on college campuses, where growing numbers of students claim either no religion or strong religious affiliation, with the middle ground shrinking, said Alexander Astin, director of the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA, which last year completed a national study of students' beliefs.
In the survey, more than 70 percent of students said they prayed, discussed religion or spirituality with friends, found religion personally helpful and gained spiritual strength by trusting in a higher power.
You're not a boomer.
They got married in the D.C. area, and had the reception at ... name's dropped out of my memory ... a big historic house in Old Town Alexandria, really big, red brick. It was interesting because it had many small rooms, and it was difficult to find anything. There was dancing somewhere, and food somewhere, but all Mom and I could find was the champagne, so after three glasses, we had to say goodbye before Mom was too sloshed to drive!
The church where they were married has also faded from mind, it's been about 12 years, but it was Episcopal, and they chose it because of the musicians. "If we're going to go to church, we want to have the best classical musicians!"
She's a nice girl, but a bit of a poseur :-).
Always an invitation to spread the word, eh? When people see the trials life has thrown me, they are amazed at how I can remain so level - I give credit to Christ, where it belongs.
I don't have a problem with some of these "cool" Christian movements. I have a 13 year old son, having some of these in the spotlight has opened conversations between us and between him and his friends. The seed was sown and their eagerness to learn more about Jesus Christ and the Bible can't be a bad thing, y'know?
Best wishes. But this is what I'm telling you. It's not about me. It's not about if I'm on a useless mission or not. Witnessing to others, spreading the gospel, teaching, preaching, baptising in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost is not about ME. It's not about how many was I able to reach this time. When we think like that, we are puting the focus on ourselves, instead of God.
I agree that we disagree.
The article doesn't give much information about the content of the groups they're talking about, only their style. If meeting in a gym and playing basketball (or shaving their heads and wearing earrings) is bringing people to solid Christian teaching, then I think it's positive.
We are conservative in dress and lifestyle and worship, but that doesn't mean everyone has to be. I wouldn't say, "Jesus is my homeboy," because that's not the colloquialism I grew up with, but I do say that Jesus is my older brother, and God is my Abba, which is just as familiar.
Nobody is calling for churches to take God's name in vain to reach the lost.
And the article never mentions it, and does not even suggest that this is happening in a single church in the US.
Music, for instance, is also a part of American culture. And allowing drums to be played during a service does not automatically mean that the preacher is going to be getting it on with the groupies backstage.
In other words, I think you are oversimplifying the issue.
Actually, the female line of this clothing says: "Mary is my Homegirl". That's the one I saw Madonna wearing. Either way, one has to consider motive in this case. Clearly, Madonna and several other Hollywood types are doing this for other reasons than salvation...at least, that's the impression I get.
Now, that's not saying that T-Shirts are not a witnessing tool, or those who wear them are wrong. It depends on the message, it depends on the individual's motive, and their degree of committment to Christ. I have a plain grey t-shirt that says "I am the wretch the song refers to", and it's actually helped start several different conversations with complete strangers about Christianity and faith in God.
If it can be used for good, then so be it. If it's being used to be "hip", or some sort of shock-value mockery, then it's just wrong.
And no one said it was, but thanks for the strawman sermon.
Indian Harbor - LOL!
Cato, I think you are the FR authority on all things WASPy.
Good post
St. Barts....again LOL!
"Much of what I see in NYC is church-as-religion-themed-social-club."
In that regard, many churchs and bars have more in common than not.
Not here: Times Square Church
I am concerned indeed about the youth. They don't respect anything which isn't theirs. But our church has been stagnant for a while and people admit their are wanting to be status quo with their "contemporary" services.
One of the best examples is worship services. The minister of music at our church is younger than ANY of the 36-member choir members at church. I, as a 28-year old single man, do not see any teens for the most part in our 11 AM service, because none of them like to sing hymns. They prefer to be entertained by a rock feel. There are no members of the choir younger than myself, and I'm still a rookie in the choir, having received classical vocal training at 26 and irking some choir members .
While I'm at home comfortable with the great hymns of the 16th, 17th, and 18th century, there are few singers in our church who feel at home with these hymns. Most would rather rock at the early service with the amplified instruments and even voices, and I have learned one reason I do not have the solo opportunity at church is because my voice is classically trained, and most singers at our church aren't.
Today's generation is full on using soundtracks instead of live instruments, beat over message, and pop culture over the things which matter most.
And the culture is showing it. The choir, using canned music for a musical, couldn't draw 250 people to our Easter musical, and was relegated to a background position so dancers can dominate the stage during our performance. Last Christmas we were bounced from the programme to the shock of the choir members. We were set on singing "When Love Came Down" (I was eagerly anticipating it for weeks) when we were told we had been pulled for 30 puppets lip-synching to the song and dancers.
It seems in today's church, dancers, hip-hop artists, and other things are replacing choirs for the arts, and I wonder what will happen when our generation retires. How can you wonder when kids in tie-dye tee-shirts and jeans dancing to "Spirit in the Sky" and kids imitating performances on stage by lip-synching and faking instruments playing while a canned piece plays has more appeal than hearing a pianist or organist playing a song for the choir such as "The Majesty and Glory of Your Name"?
Sometimes I wonder about what's happening in our churches.
For one thing, it's because we (both clergy and lay people) are serious about our Christianity. Also, we give them an island of stability in a very confusing world. Third, we genuinely love our kids, but they're still kids, and we teach them as such -- and the kids appreciate it. Fourth, we give them a meaningful part of our services -- we have two kids' choirs, a youth choir, and a thriving acolyte program.
IOW, it's not hard to keep kids in church. As with most of what ails society these days, we need only remind ourselves that we are the grown-ups, and the kids are not.
When I first came to New York to practice law in the early '80s, the invite to St. Bart's young adults group landed on my desk within a fortnight.... From my perch in Greenwich, I have a ringside seat and certain standing invitations to goings on about town..... I was introduced to WASP, Where is Thy Sting? in the '70s by a descendent of one of the founders of Rye, although, I recognize even more of my forebears in King's Southern Ladies and Gentlemen.....
We go to a small Vineyard church. The funny thing is that my kids (7, 7, 9) act the way I did when I was growing up in a conservative Methodist church.
My kids can't stand listening to worship (contemporary music). If they have to listen to the minister talk, they really can't stand it.
The Sunday School at our church is very much like it was when I was young. They memorize Bible versus, make a craft, have a Bible lesson, and have prayer time. The older kids also discuss things concerning them like how to handle bullying, drugs, etc.
My kid all love their Sunday School classes. My 9 year old is really getting a lot out of church these days. He notices a real difference between the kids at church and the non-Christian kids at public school. He's routinely praying for kids that mis-treat him or that he thinks are having troubles.
I actually picked the church based on the members and the message that the pastor was giving. I like traditonal style of church services, but the churches that I visited that had this style were way too liberal in their messages. One Presbyterian church was allowing a lesbian minister preach at their church.
I'll take contemporary music and conservative Bible based message any day over traditional service with liberal non-Biblical teaching.
Add in some church support for same sex couples and abortion and you may get a grasp on why some young people see the "church" as a false path to salvation. It is hypocritical to embrace and sanctify sin and murder. We expect more from our church leaders.
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