Evangelism is…a call to service…It will include a call to join the living Lord in the work of his kingdom. It will direct attention to the aspirations of ordinary men and women in society, their dreams of justice, security, full stomachs, human dignity, and opportunities for their children.
Thanks for the question! You know you’re not going to get a simple answer, right? Here’s some of our answers:
“I call myself a mystical humanist. I believe in natural revelation. I am not a theist. I groove on the Tao!”
“My bumper sticker response is you don’t have to be Christian, cause lord knows the vast majority of Christians aren’t missional, but I think you do need to have a strong sense of the transcendent, even if that is conceived as the Human Spirit – something that shifts you from self to other in a fundamental way and creates a culture that church is not about you but about helping you get over the “you” or what so much of consumer culture says is you. You know, now that I think of it, I do think personally that my id-ing primarily as a Christian and secondarily as a UU, the way I would think a Methodist might in their case too, putting denomination second, might be a precipitating factor. It throws me into deeper waters, perhaps, of history than simply 1961 or 1825 or even 1620, and I feel a strong connection with pre-325 and pre-70 ekklesia which is more missional; but even here, it seems like you could also just as easily id as buddhist and be as missionally rooted or more.”
“I’m neither Christian or theist. The best I identify is as a Universalist religious humanist. The whole God issue is moot for me. The only way it enters into my religious practice at all is in a Star Wars ‘The Force’ kind of way. I was raised in and was a devout Christian until about the age of 20 when I left due to being fed up with fundamentalism and the rising prosperity Christianity nonsense. I can speak fluent Christian and use it as a primary source because of my familiarity with it. I was very missional with my Christianity. I carried the concepts through into my Pagan practices, and am thrilled to see it emerging within the UU faith community.”
“Aside from answering that I am a Unitarian Universalist, the rest of the answer depends on the day, and the context of the question. And the tenor of the questioner. If the questioner meant ‘theist’ as in, do I believe in A divinity, then no. If he/she meant theist as in, do I believe in DIVINITY, then yes. My mom (who is a staunch and loving Roman Catholic) and I often talk about how I am a ‘little-c catholic.’ I definitely belong to the one holy, catholic and apostolic church, which, for the record, is not run by the pope but by the power of love. Jesus certainly understood that pretty well, and I give him credit where it’s due. What we call the sacred is much less important to me than what we are called to do after we experience it in our lives. Which is why, as I said in the beginning, I am a Unitarian Universalist.”
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And, a fusion of the opinion of several of us:
One of the tasks and missions of the Red Pill Brethren is to help Unitarian Universalists have less of a need to ask this question and much less needy to require an answer to it. Being needy for an answer to this question is evidence of having swallowed the blue pill… I have an overall uncomfortableness with the question in the first place. Our Faith still seems so fixated with putting things in well defined boxes, when the reality is that we all function within Mandelbrot shaped polygons. My answer to the question would probably be ‘If we are doing the good work, why does it matter what we claim as our personal faith or denominational structure.’ I know for a fact when I’m handing out food to the hungry or clothes to the naked, they don’t ask what I believe or to whom I pray…The point of being missional, to me, is to focus on what we do with what we believe, and get beyond the need to categorize. The conversation is a valuable one, but it’s peripheral to the work of the missional church. I think sometimes when people ask this kind of question, the answer that would be of most benefit is to tell them how what we believe shapes what we do.
“A new valuation is being placed upon life. We accept the world for the joyous place it was meant to be. We like it, despite the fact that belated theologians look upon it with inherited suspicion … The dominant motive, therefore, is no longer to escape from earthly existence, but to make earthly existence as abundant and happy as it can be made. Modern religion …must speed those readjustments which will make life here and now justify our hopes.”
Clarence R. Skinner, The Social Implications of Universalism (Boston: Universalist Pub. House, 1915), 47.
Vietnamese nuns build a community in Houston
…Their disciplined way of life begins at 5 a.m. with an hour and a half of prayer and worship, followed by breakfast before they commute to full-time jobs. After work, they pray together again before they prepare meals and eat. During meals they have lessons, so they can be “fed physically and intellectually.”
Different activities on their packed agenda each evening include visiting nursing homes and the sick, studying, preparing lessons and holding workshops. Before they retire, there is more prayer.
“We sacrifice ourselves in service of others,” Sister Bernadette said. “We limit ourselves to entertainment for 45 minutes once a week. We lead a very balanced life, and there is lots of joy, laughter and singing. We balance between prayer life, community life and work life.”
The sisters have always been self-supporting with working incomes. All work full time either in their preschool, as Catholic schoolteachers, or as nurses. One sister teaches at the University of St. Thomas.
Love is creative and redemptive. Love builds up and unites; hate tears down and destroys. The aftermath of the “fight with fire” method which you suggest is bitterness and chaos, the aftermath of the love method is reconciliation and creation of the beloved community.
He whose wisdom is more abundant than his works, to what is his like? To a tree whose branches are abundant but whose roots are few; and the wind comes and uproots it and overturns it (as it is written, “He shall be like a tamerisk in the desert and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness”). But he whose works are more abundant than his wisdom, to what is he like? To a tree whose branches are few but whose roots are many; so that even if all the winds in the world come and blow against it, it cannot be stirred from its place (as it is written, “He shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out his roots by the river, and shall not fear when heat cometh, and his leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit”).
—Mishnah Aboth, 3:18 (with Jeremiah 17:6, 8)
Anna Snoeyenbos wrote: If anyone in the Atlanta area is interested in the sacrament of footwashing – I volunteer at the Open Door Community every Wednesday night. Come for a community supper and then an evening of caring for the feet of Atlanta’s homeless. Visit http://opendoorcommunity.org/ for more info.
“Dolores Scott carefully rolled up the cuffs of Willie Wright’s khaki pants and helped the 50-year-old man remove his socks and shoes.
Wright sighed as she helped him place his feet in a large bowl of warm, sudsy water.
With a washcloth, Scott gently scrubbed his feet, paying careful attention to his toes.
He closed his eyes, relaxed and leaned back into the chair. Once Wright’s feet were clean, 70-year-old Scott powdered, lotioned and slipped them into a new pair of white socks.
Wright smiled.
So did Scott.
And then Wright put on his new knit cap, picked up his bag and headed back out onto the street — his home. …”
Ooh, good stuff.
a) Yes, they are missional,
b) We are familiar with them, in fact, one of the Brethren in his various online ministries refers to them often as prime examples coming out of a more progressive theology than many.
c) Expect to hear more about them here, as well as Koinonia Farm, A Simple Way, FaithWalking, and Courageous Church.
Thanks for the question, and please bring up any other missional movements as you recall/hear about them. We’d like this to become a good resource for all seeking inspiration about missional living.
A sermon by the Rev. Chuck Freeman. (Click on clip above his name.)
“If We’re Going to Be the Religion of our Time, Shouldn’t We at Least Be Religious?”
Red Pill Brethren 