nEW yORKER and Luhrman examine evangelical congregations

[Stephen Fox]

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/b ... ntPage=all

[Sandy]

I'm in the middle of some historical reading at the moment, but as Spring Break is right around the corner, I'll have to pick up a copy of this book and spend some time with it while I'm sitting beside the Cass River in Michigan, enjoying the crisp, fresh, spring air.

I'm not sure that Vineyard Christian Fellowships are necessarily completely representative of the whole of Evangelical Christianity, nor that observing from a distance with an anthropologists eye would reveal everything that is there to see. But I think it is always important to look at serious observations of the church, and give the observer credit for a critical eye.

I would have to concur with her conclusion that the general atmosphere inside the churches she observed, one of self-interest and the pursuit of personal comfort, is pervasive in a significant proportion of Evangelical Christian churches. There are a lot of people who gather for the Sunday morning service in golf shorts and t-shirts, to hear some good music and a good "talk" with power point slides by the pastor who is bent on making them feel good so that they'll drop some bucks in the plate and come back for more next week.

But Luhrmann either doesn't notice, or doesn't encounter, the element of self-sacrifice that is there as well. It's the thing that makes people look past the accumulation of personal wealth to sacrifice their time and their personal preferences to serve on mission fields where personal comfort isn't anywhere nearby. And while a lot of "mission trips" are generally exotic vacations to soothe guilty consciences for those who can afford them, I know teenagers who live for the chance to spend their spring break in the Dominican Republic, in appalling conditions, in order to minister to Haitian refugees who need their hands for simple service. Luhrmann misses that.

[Stephen Fox]

Take a copy of Stephens and Giberson's The Anointed to the Lake as well.

When you return you'll add much more to this board, than say, Gene Scarborough.

Thanks for your review of the New Yorker article. Long as all the bathwater is not thrown away, always hope for the Baby, cause the Spirit and the Wordagod are strong.

[Stephen Fox]

Luhrman on NPR Fresh Air Today; fascinating chat, especially when she said In America God became a god of unconditional Love about 1965

Her Grandfather was a Baptist Preacher.

[Stephen Fox]

New book by Ross Douthat

http://www.tnr.com/book/review/bad-reli ... ss-douthat

[KeithE]

Luhrman’s book When God Talk Back looks good and its thesis that we must develop a listening attitude in prayer rings true to me.

OTOH, Bad Religion by Russ Douthat is bad itself. Spent sometime looking it over last weekend in a B&N stuffed chair. Seems mostly he wants to complain about Dan Brown novels, contemporary services and prosperity gospel and just says return to his “orthodox” view which he describes as the “core" of Catholic, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Protestantism w/o much definition of what that might be (at least I could it in the time I spent with the book ~ 5 minutes). His authoritarian style (‘believe me’) turned me off.

[Stephen Fox]

Noll's review is about a year after the fact, but it is of some length and it is Mark Noll. Well worth your time if the couple pages I read are indicative. I plan to come back to it. From the Sept 13 print issue.

http://www.tnr.com/article/magazine/boo ... h?page=0,0