I responded as follows:
Well, on a general level, I'd say yes. There are pockets of hope. Not to brag too much but PGUMC grows every year, has a vigorous youth program, a very large portion of members are roughly from mid-20's to mid-50's - families all. Lisa and I, at 43 and 41, are about average, age-wise, maybe even a tad to the old side of the mean.
I agree with you that the Church is doing far too little far too late in many instances, and the kind of shallow garbage being peddled at Wesley Seminary at this conference is not a sign of vigorous life. At the same time, the issue itself is, I believe, a vital one - it speaks to the possibility of seeing grace quite literally everywhere, divorcing it from dogmatic formulas and the stale and sterile proclamations of too many dead white men, and gives it a living presence. When we no longer feel the need to create little enclaves of holiness, but see the Holy even in the horrific, not to mention the mundane; when we can teach others this isn't something special or weird, but a possibility of a faith that is open to the whole world - maybe, just maybe we might be taking a step away from the abyss. It isn't everything, and there are far too many ingrained bad habits in the church to believe that they can be shed overnight, or even in a relatively short period of time. Yet, I believe, the radical affirmation of life, of the world, of all of us in all the different ways we live and love and fear and rage and die is the first step toward true holiness of heart.
I realized after I wrote it that I had been standing on a bit of a soapbox. I also realized, somewhat shamefacedly, that the position I had spelled out was far more mystical than anything else. Rather than try to plumb the depths of various dogmatic statements or creedal formulas, I was offering a view of the Christian life that sees hope and possibility not in a retreat in to our ecclesial enclaves, but in the ecstatic, mundane, and even horrific events around us.
In a recent conversation with Feodor, he wrote:
you rarely take the moralist stance when it comes to systemic analysis, contra Lasch.
I had thought that we split because I seek the moralist (categorizing) line in analysis and you like to rub it out.
So when you say you "don't" consider yourself a moralist, that strikes true to me, at least in terms of systemic thinking.
That's why I quipped that it's odd that you would so take to Lasch.
I think that my view of a life of faith - one that sees God's grace suffusing all of life, explains why I am not a "moralist" in the traditional sense. Rather than make some kind of lengthy argument as to why this or that position is more ethical than another, I begin with the assumption that whether or not we can or do hold some kind of moral standard is beside the point. I assume that God's presence sets aside our petty concerns with "right" and "wrong"; God wants us to realize that the greatest elemental force in the Universe isn't gravity, but love. It's the glue that holds all the craziness together. It can be seen, if we open our eyes, everywhere.
This, obviously, does not erase the need to seek justice, to decry inhumanity, to comfort the afflicted with the promise that God seeks their full humanity. On the contrary, doing all this and more rests precisely on the realization that, as a God of love and life, we are to do these things and more with more urgency than ever. There isn't an argument one can make about this, though. Sitting around and discussing the hypostatic union, or the nature of the immanent versus economic Trinity is as meaningless as sitting around and discussing Platonic forms. Rather than sitting around and making a case as to why this particular belief in God as a God of infinite desire for creation, this understanding drives one to live it.
