Young people turn against their parents' 'church lite'

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.

"Homeboy" means someone from your nieghborhood, someone you trust, someone you know.

As in, "I know Christ".

But it's really bad to say that because it's not exactly the words someone else thinks you should use.
___________________________________________________________

I think I saw my first 'Jesus is my homeboy' t-shirt yesterday. I couldn't quite make out all of the last word, but now I guess that is what it was. Thanks for the definition. One of my kids came in about the time I read that, and she pretty much concurred.

Maybe it's not a bad thing. It looks like Jesus and the disciples met people 'where they were':

1Cr 3:1 And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, [even] as unto babes in Christ. http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/1Cr/3/1.html [notice even Peter didn't 'get it' at first]

1Cr 3:2 I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able [to bear it], neither yet now are ye able. http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/1Cr/3/2.html

1Cr 3:3 For ye are yet carnal: for whereas [there is] among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?

1Cr 3:4 For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I [am] of Apollos; are ye not carnal?

1Cr 3:5 Who then is Paul, and who [is] Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man?

1Cr 3:6 I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.

1Cr 3:7 So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/1Cr/3/7.html So it would appear that all those who say we plant the seed, and God will do the rest, are correct. Hmmm, come to think of it, a garden is usually filled with a variety of plants with a variety of needs.

I rather like the t-shirt slogan - it implies a real intimacy with Christ. A lot of today's kids have been abandoned on the altar of parental selfishness, and there is a real need for love and friendship to take the place of that which is not found at home. [What the devil intends for evil, God will turn to His glory.]

Look at the people in Samaria, when the woman at the well dropped her jar to run and tell them the Good News. Those who were 'not my people' were more inclined to jump at the chance for His offer of salvation, then the nation of Israel. And like someone else said, we are called to be His priesthood, and if we can't do it, He will raise up someone who can. Pretty amazing. Mabe He's raising up a new Priesthood. Maybe they are taking seriously His offer to be His FRIEND:

Jhn 15:14 Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.

Jhn 15:15 Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you. http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/Jhn/15/15.html

Jhn 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.
http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/Jhn/15/16.html

As I remember it, the original disciples were rather a motley group of characters. 'God will use the 'foolish' things of this world to confound the wise.' He works in mysterious ways. I tend to believe this is His doing, particulary since so many of the churches have matured to the point of becoming dead. There's nothing to prevent the elder generation to reprove and set straight when doctrines get off track, however.

Maybe all is working toward fulfilment of the new covenant, when 'they will no longer say know the LORD, know the LORD, for they will ALL know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them.'

you said " As in, "I know Christ". "

I ran across this passage this morning, that I had been meaning to look up anyway. It seems to fit:

http://www.blueletterbible.org/ kjv/Jer/Jer009.html#23
Jer 9:23 Thus saith the LORD, Let not the wise [man] glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty [man] glory in his might, let not the rich [man] glory in his riches:

Jer 9:24 But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I [am] the LORD which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these [things] I delight, saith the LORD. *** http://www.blueletterbible.org/tsk_b/Jer/9/24.html

Have you read the magazine Relevant? I've read one issue. I was TOTALLY unimpressed. It's like trying to have it both ways -- Christian and worldly. It crossed the line, in my opinion. I'm fine with hip worship styles. I went to a church recently where the pastor had a very long beard and many of the parishoners were barefoot. But they were worshipful. They did not try to redefine God as some hip dude who was like totally obsessed with entertainment you know. I've been to more traditional services that were pretty dead. There is truth on both sides of this issue. But there is a lot of crossing the line going on in churches today. I would say that the major error I see is in being too permissive. Churches, especially their youth, are having great difficulty understanding that God hates sin; He is not honored by it just because we are willing to elevate it in church.

The Bible reveals a great deal about the character of God, and about how He wants us to worship Him. Too often we try to define God in our own image. We redefine his forgiveness to mean that sin does not matter, or that holiness is not important to Him anymore. It is going to get increasingly difficult to reach a lost world with the gospel of Jesus Christ when the "church" itself is acting pretty lost.

After watching a beautiful yet graphic portrayal of the high price Jesus paid for our sins, how can we possibly miss understanding how passionate He is about holiness?

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.