trying out Typepad

For now, try me out at http://andrewdailey.typepad.com/

trying out Typepad

Not sure if I am typepadding for life, but visit me over there for now . . . http://andrewdailey.typepad.com/

From Sweet's - Out of the Question book

He even asserts that “sin is not a breaking of commands; sin is a breaking of relationships” because sin violates our relationships with God. Our purpose for living, says Sweet - the very reason we were created - is to be in dynamic relationship. Thats good stuff.

Inverted Totalitarianism, mega-churches, and church growth theology

Inverted Totalitarianism, mega-churches, and church growth theology http://harbinger.blogs.com/ I have on two occasions heard one of the US's most prominent theologians claim that church growth theology is to contemporary theologians as Nazism was to Karl Barth and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Background info: * Church growth theology, popularized by Donald McGavran, views church growth as the central aim of Christian mission and evangelism. In pursuing that aim, sociological analysis, means-end rationality, and even marketing strategies are utilized to achieve the goal of increasing church membership. Church growth theology is exemplified in the US by mega-churches and seeker-sensitive churches such as Willow Creek and Saddleback. Decisions in regard to the presentation and communication of the gospel message, the format of worship services, the organization and structure of the church staff and budget, are all oriented to maximizing the membership of the church. * Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German theologian, was involved in an underground seminary during Hitler's reign and participated in a plot to assassinate Hitler, for which he was executed. * Karl Barth, a Swiss theologian, penned the Barmen Declaration, a prophetic challenge to the prevalent accomodation of German churches to Hitler and Nazism. Back to the point! Anyways, on the first occasion that this theologian compared church growth theology to Nazism, I was somewhat taken aback by what seemed unacceptably hyperbolic and unfair. But the second time, I realized that driving the comparison was a concern that church growth practitioners had uncritically embraced the marketing, means-end logic of multi-national corporate capitalism. The theologian viewed, in my opinion rightly, this marketing logic as a ravenously destructive force that is devastating human values, colonizing every aspect of human culture, and transferring all human ideals into cash-value, profit-loss equations. Health, art, marriage, family, the environment, music, news, education, love, beauty, death, communication, romance, meals, sexuality, friendship, style, fashion, politics, vocation, and entertainment together constitute some of the most cherished, meaningful facets of human existence. Each of these realms, once protected from the logic of economic exchange, has been quite recently devoured by profit-motive capitalist logic. Think HMO's. Think pre-nuptial contracts. Think EMO's (educational management organizations). Think media conglomeration. Think fast food. Think "Jack" of Fight Club's insurance company fatality/litigation equation. In each case, human experience is increasingly rendered legitimate or illegitimate in terms of cash value, efficiency, and return on investment. Human values are now overwhelmingly cash values, and the result is a comprehensive dehumanization of life and the fostering of market morality. Market morality treats every human being as an isolated individual who pursues goals and ambitions on the basis of the maximization of pleasure and acquisition. Sheldon Wolin, one of the most important living political theorists, has referred to this situation as inverted totalitarianism. In traditional totalitarian governments, such as Nazi Germany, the government exercises complete and total control over every sector of society, including the business and economic realms. In inverted totalitarianism, it is the business and economic sector that control every aspect of society, including the government, including culture. The Democratic and Republican office-holders, and indeed entire nation-states, become the agents of massive, billion-dollar corporations. All of human social life is subjected to the control of impenetrable bureaucratic organizations, whether governmental or corporate, which determine social life on the basis of considerations of capital and efficiency. And so when the sacred, the religious, the one aspect of human existence that is supposed to be as far removed as possible from the considerations of worldly economics, embraces wholeheartedly the logic of marketing, efficiency, and growth, we have due cause for alarm. The German churches of the 1930s believed they could mix "German" and "Christian" and suffer no loss. The church growth churches of the 2000's believe they can mix marketing and Christianity and suffer no loss. Who will write the Barmen declaration of our age?

A New Year's Prayer

MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. Thomas Merton