2. From the place where But doubts and loves
we are right
Dig up the world
Flowers will never
grow Like a mole, a plow.
In the spring.
And a whisper will be
The place where we heard in the place
are right Where the ruined
Is hard and trampled House once stood.
Like a yard. Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai
3. a new kind of
christianity:
ten questions that
are transforming the
faith
4. Something is on the way out and something else
is painfully being born.
It is as if something were crumbling, decaying, and
exhausting itself,
while something else, still indistinct, were arising
from the rubble....
We are in a phase when one age is succeeding
another, when everything is possible.
Vaclav Havel, “The New Measure of Man”
5. It would be very surprising if this
religion, so youthful, yet so varied in its
historical experience, had now revealed
all its secrets.
Diarmaid MacCulloch
(Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years [Viking, 2009] p. 1016)
6. Fr. Vincent Donovan:
Do not leave them where they are.
Do not bring them to where you are, as
beautiful as that place might be.
Instead, go with them to a new place
neither of you has ever been before.
7. 500 years ago: Luther’s 95 theses.
Theses are statements of belief
intended for debate, to bring us to a
new state.
Needed today: not statements, debate,
or a new state (static location)
Rather ...
10. What are the questions?
1. The narrative question: What is the shape of the
biblical narrative? Storyline, plotline?
2. The authority question: What is the Bible, and
what is it for? How does it have authority?
3. The God question: Is God violent? Why does
God seem so violent and genocidal in so many
bible passages?
11. 4. The Jesus Question: Who is Jesus, and
why does he matter?
5. The Gospel Question: What is the gospel
- a message of evacuation or
transformation? Exclusion or inclusion?
12. 6. The church question: What do we
do about the church?
7. The sex question: Can we deal
with issues of sexuality without
fighting and dividing?
8. The future question: Can we find a
more hopeful vision of the future?
13. 9. The pluralism question: How
should we relate to people of other
faiths?
10. The next step question: How can
we pursue this quest in humility,
love, and peace?
22. sdrawkcab gnidaer
Rick Warren, Billy Graham, Charles Finney, John Wesley (or Calvin), Luther,
Aquinas, Augustine, Paul, Jesus
reading forwards
Adam, Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, John the Baptist, Jesus
34. Neither revolution nor reformation
can ultimately change a society,
rather you must tell a new powerful
tale, one so persuasive that it sweeps
away the old myths and becomes the
preferred story …
35. … one so inclusive that it gathers all the
bits of our past and our present into a
coherent whole, one that even shines
some light into the future so that we can
take the next step…. If you want to
change a society, then you have to tell an
alternative story.
- attributed to Ivan Illich (Austrian former priest,
philosopher, social critic, 1926-2002)
42. Coral: Quest for theosis
__________
Ultraviolet: Quest for sacredness
Violet: Quest for ubuntu (otherliness)
__________
Indigo: Quest for honesty
Blue: Quest for Individuality
Green: Quest for Independence
Yellow: Quest for power
Orange: Quest for security
Red: Quest for survival
43. Coral: Quest for theosis
__________
Ultraviolet: Quest for sacredness
Violet: Quest for ubuntu (otherliness)
__________
Indigo: Quest for honesty
Blue: Quest for Individuality
Green: Quest for Independence
Yellow: Quest for power
Orange: Quest for security
Red: Quest for survival
45. Cultures may include two
or more zones, but will
have a center of gravity in
one.
They may regress.
47. If we don’t differentiate or
transcend, we experience
stagnation, fixation and
stuckness.
If we don’t integrate and include,
we experience disassociation
and a backward attack-focus.
48. Coral: Quest for theosis
__________
Ultraviolet: Quest for sacredness
Violet: Quest for ubuntu (otherliness)
__________
Indigo: Quest for honesty
Blue: Quest for Individuality
Green: Quest for Independence
Yellow: Quest for power
Orange: Quest for security
Red: Quest for survival
49. First tier zones think in terms
of right/wrong and good/evil.
Other zones are evil/wrong:
our zone is good/right.
50. Second tier zones think in terms of
appropriate and adequate.
Other zones are adequate for
their times and situations; we seek
the zone that is appropriate for us
here and now.
51. Think of climbing a ladder.
You gain a new and wider view from each
rung.
Your earlier view was not wrong - only
partial.
Early zones truly describe the way the
world looks to people at that vantage point.
You couldn’t get to the higher rungs if it
weren’t for the lower rungs.
52. This approach is not absolutist.
It doesn’t claim one view is right and
previous (or later) ones are wrong.
Nor is it relativist.
It doesn’t say that no views are truly
right, but only think they are.
It says all views are partial and that
greater wholeness is better than lesser
wholeness.
53. St. Paul seems to agree:
When I was a child, I spoke and thought
and reasoned like a child,
But when I became an adult,
I gave up childish ways.
For now we see in a mirror dimly,
But then face to face.
Now I know in part; then I shall
understand fully,
Even as I have been fully
understood.
54. So faith, hope, and love abide, these
three;
But the greatest of these is
love.
I will show you the most excellent
way.
Follow the way of love.
Amen.
55. Exercise:
Consider the following in light of the spiral
dynamics schema: Coral: one with God
__________
Your life Ultraviolet: holistic, unifying
Violet: integral, systemic, otherly
Your church __________
Indigo: pluralist, relativist, globalist
Your denomination Blue: individualist, rationalist, ideologue
Green: nationalist, rules, codes
Your nation Yellow: feudal, power-oriented
Orange: tribal, magical, animist
The world Red: survival, instinctual, “reptilian”
Where is the center of gravity?
Where are the points of tension?
Where are breakthroughs happening?
57. How can we help our communities move
forward?
What will cause people to entrench?
What cost will we pay for stimulating
forward movement?
How can we make our churches safe for
people at each zone?
How can we not get stuck?