So many words...

“Lutherans just have so many words.”

It was said yesterday in the course of a lunch time conversation after worship yesterday. The subject was outreach, and there were a lot of good ideas kicked around about how we might do a better, more faithful job of bearing the Good News into our communities and inviting folks to share Christ’s abundant life with us. Things like music, discipleship, community were all on the table…salutary topics that must and will be addressed in this place. But the one item that I find sticking with me in mulling over our conversation is less about the substance of what we do and more about the media by which those things are conveyed. “Lutherans just have so many words.” While not exactly offered as a complaint, neither was it expressed as a compliment.

“Lutherans just have so many words.” Of course, we do. We Lutherans emerged as a theological tradition primarily on the power of a media revolution. Not to ignore the role of the rise of German nationalism: but really…were it not for the printing press, Fr. Martin and his co-conspirators would have had a very difficult time getting their theological points made and their reforms enacted. Lutherans have so many words because we were born in the midst of printed words. And we have relied on those printed words and the rising literacy they engendered to make our way ever since.

So how do we communicate to a world for which the printed word is waning? How do we make a 16^th century handbook of the faith (still a faithful and relevant exposition of what it means to be Christian) accessible to a 21^st century public programmed to receive and respond in digital visual forms? These are the questions we need to take seriously…or we might as well appoint the last person out the door to turn out the lights. And please note: this is not about merely being fashionable or throwing out the substance of what we believe. Quite the contrary: It is about learning to live and speak and share the profound insights of the Reformation in a way which today’s hurting and harried world can understand. I’m convinced that folks still need and can benefit from what the Lutheran tradition has to say. So, not unlike the lessons learned by missionaries of old, this is about the church learning the language of the culture to which it is sent.

Yes…we Lutherans just have so many words…beautiful, faithful, powerful words rooted in the Word. Why keep them to ourselves? Let’s learn to speak again.

Ashes to go...

AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty

I’m still not quite sure what to make of this: The Episcopal churches of southern Maine imposed (distributed?) ashes on/to folks on the streets of Portland and other cities on this most recent Ash Wednesday. According to the AP, the church’s motto for the day was “You’re on the go, so [we] bring the ashes to you.” The little sign is a nice touch, too.

*sigh*

I understand that the Episcopal Church USA is really concerned about their declining membership. Most mainline denominations are facing, if not succumbing to, the same problem. And I understand that, in order to combat that decline, the church needs to explore some outside-the-box ways of taking the Good News to the street. McAshes, however, just doesn’t seem to be the right strategy.

The church is not a retail institution. Its profound inability to reach the people by traditional means (i.e. stay inside and wait until someone shows up) still does not warrant trying to make the church conform to certain retail sensibilities about product sampling and public events marketing. Eugene Peterson wrote some years ago about the denigration of clergy as religious shop-keepers. This kind of stunt only confirms his argument. Christianity cannot be vended alongside street food and fake Ray-bans.

Christianity can, however, be shared even more effectively (I would argue) on those very same streets by the community formed around that ashen cross and the baptismal covenant out of which it arises. Those folks who stop to consider their mortality, reflect on their sinfulness, and give thanks for the grace which marks them are completely equipped to leave their places of worship and go to work in the world bearing God’s mercy and love on and through themselves. I’m having a hard time imagining that so much necessary work gets done during a thirty-second stop on a cold, winter sidewalk.

Those who disagree may well cite my lack of imagination. So be it. But I would rather spend more time forming the community that incarnates Christ in its daily work and play than spend time forming distribution strategies for dust.

By the way, you kids: get off my lawn.