What I've Learned (2)

Section One of this series dealt with what I miss now that I am doing "secular" ministry after thirty years as a parish pastor. Section Two was about what I don't miss. Section Three is talking about "secular ministry."
Links to earlier sections:
Introduction
1. What I Miss: Part 1, part 2, part 3
2. What I Don't Miss: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Interlude
3. Secular Ministry: Part 1, Part 2
4. What I've Learned: Part 1
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Last week I talked about the humility that I truly needed to learn if I was to begin to notice what the world thinks of the church and of religions in general. If I wasn’t humbled before, I would certainly be once I got out into the secular world and discovered what is happening with many people.

They could care less if the church exists. Many have left the church behind in a world that we have long since left behind. Even those who still attend church may keep it quiet. Even Christians don’t always talk about what they believe or where they go to church. It is like being part of a secret society- without even knowing who the other members are. As a result church and religious views are often viewed as irrelevant.

Sadly the church doesn’t help matters any. Sometime go through the church listings on a Saturday and look at the sermon titles. Some are meant to be cute. Some are meant to convey some hint of the sermon. Most are nothing shot of yawn-inducing. The same is true with many notices on church signs. They range from dull to schmaltzy to “inside jokes” to (as I mentioned last week) downright offensive. The better ones- the ones that actually do what they’re supposed to do- are often thought inducing, positive, and hopeful, addressing real issues in people’s lives. The exception, sadly, not the rule.

Which leads to an even sadder understanding of the church in the greater community. We are irrelevant. We don’t speak to their world. The view they get from us is that we are disconnected.

And the view they get from the headliners of the faith makes it even worse. There they discover that Christians are bigots, anti-scientific, controlling, intolerant, and downright judgmental. And those appear as our good points. The hijacking of the church by the radical religious right may be one of the greatest theological crimes since the Inquisition. Yes, that is strong, but they have so ruined the image of the church that any positive work we do will often be brought into suspicious scrutiny and discounted, our motives seen as mixed or malevolent.

I have sat in groups and watched reactions from people when a Christian starts talking about their faith. I see eyes glaze over, people turn their heads, others try to look interested. Some, and I know there are many like this, fortunately, will listen intently trying to figure out if the person is sincere and open or a right-wing bigot. Some will listen for the kernels of hope and truth that they know must be there or the person wouldn’t be talking so intensely and deeply about something so personal.

In that is the hope! Because I have also learned that people are by nature spiritual. As a species we are incredibly open seekers. We look for hope or meaning wherever we can find it. We have our radar going in two directions at once- seeking out the BS factor while allowing the spirit that God has placed within each of us to seek for ways that will turn our lives into spiritually fulfilling lives.

Perhaps one of the ways we can see how irrelevant the church seems to many is the way the phrase, “I’m spiritual but not religious” has become so common. It is how we acknowledge that we are seeking for the meaning, that connection, that transcendence, that community that opens us up to more of what we need. At the same time it marks the boundary between us and those who would use the “spiritual” for less than spiritual purposes.

I was watching C-SPAN2/Book TV on Sunday with a panel from the Los Angeles Festival of Books. They were discussing religion and culture. Christopher Hitchens, author of God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything commented that he understood that religion is supposed to make one happy. Why then do they have to make the rest of us miserable? They are not happy until they get the rest of us to think like they do. He wants us to keep it to ourselves.

“God forbid!” was my response. But it was a powerful reminder of a very common attitude which also points out the great fallacy and weakness of our traditional understanding of the ways to do evangelism. Besides the fact they don’t work well, they turn people off. They shut more doors than they open. I know, I know. God rejoices over that one lost sheep. But I don’t think God is into the kinds of things we often do that harm us and our ministry for God far more than it helps.

I know that relevance and acceptance isn’t what we are about. Just look at Jesus. But then again, do look at Jesus. He did not look for the acceptance of those in power. He did not look for the acceptance of the religious leadership. He looked for the acceptance from those who needed him. Many of them didn’t accept him, of course. But many did. Too often the church is looking for acceptance in all the wrong places and from all the wrong people.

True Jesus-based relevance will be when we learn that getting the message to the people in ourselves and our lives is what it is all about. Living and giving – not to the church but to those who need God is what needs to be done. That is not just the pastor’s job. It is probably not even the pastor’s job. It is our job each and every day.

It is essential. I will talk about that next week in the third part of what I have learned in the secular ministry I have been doing- the incredible needs that we don’t even know we have as people and how God can do something about them.