A Foot in Each Camp

The contemporary call to clergy is unlike it has ever been.

When I came from seminary, way back in 1987, cultural change was just beginning to be seen in the aisle of our churches. It could be seen in the changing values of those in the pews, those who rest on the periphery of our congregations, and those who stand outside of them. From that time onward, I have been involved in studying and analyzing the effects of cultural change on congregations and Church movements, both historically and in our contemporary situation.

Today, the Church and the world are altogether different places. The American culture has almost completely turned its back on the institutions of the past, including and especially religious ones. What contemporary culture is asking of religious institutions is only now becoming clearer, and it is quite a divergence from the historical, traditional paths of religious institutionalization.

The culture wants the Church to be an authentic resource for community spirituality and service. I mean by "community spirituality" the notion that the Church is called to represent the mercy, grace and love of Christ in, to and with its wider community. The culture demands now of religious institutions that they do precisely what they proclaim, establish God's kingdom for all people. This suggests that churches spend their time developing, establishing and maintaining faithful representation of the grace of God in Christ. Then, the culture asks of churches that they dutifully represent Christ in what they do "for the least of these." Church program and policy must be shaped around service ministries, particularly in the neighborhoods where those congregations are located.

While clergy are aware of these new trends, and while many are being equipped to help congregations meet the required cultural changes, this is distinctly contrary to what the churches want of their clergy leadership. Churches want the traditional, historical course. They want the comfortable prayers, hymns, liturgies and programs of the past. Even if it means that they will not survive in the developing culture, churches would rather die than change.

So, clergy today have a foot placed precariously in both camps. We are serving churches that seek values, practices and promises of the past in an atmosphere that demands authentic spirituality and genuine, passionate service to hurting communities as a means to building kingdom in the presence and future. The tasks of each are difficult. Together, they are impossible.

So what are clergy today to do? Do we dare choose? Do we opt for one avenue over the other? What do we teach? How do we, as Pastors, lead?

I know one thing for certain. As the gap between the cultural environs of the Church and its own demands and requirements widens, clergy who place a foot in both camps will be torn apart. These are times, instead, for new faithfulness, new leadership, creativity and imagination. The old ways are over and gone, despite the best efforts of our churches. The spiritual evolution is being necessitated, as it always has and will, by the culture in which we find ourselves. Whether or not we can and will change to meet the cultural demands of churches determines whether or not we become part of the developing culture.

I hope and pray that we can and will move forward and outward together, for Christ's sake.