Some Church Quotes

A few quotes about church have struck me recently. Now that I have finished my series on what I would do if I went back into parish ministry, I keep seeing more and more places where these thoughts are echoed or supported. First, one that Randy posted:

The church is notorious for shooting its wounded and putting its rookies on the front line (saving the fluff jobs for those who by seniority have “earned” it). We do more damage to ourselves than we have ever done to the gates of hell.

~Wayne Jacobsen, Naked Church

This is a stinging comment, but has such truth in it. One of the comments my wife and I used to make about one of the churches where we served was that they were a church that "didn't shoot their wounded." That meant that the walking wounded were treated with respect and compassion, not turned into heretics or pariahs. Sadly a look at many histories of many churches will find that this is not the norm for many of them- especially when they mess up in the church or are perceived to do so.

Next is a quote from a number of years ago that shows that this is not all that new. Inward/Outward, a ministry of The Church of the Savior, had a quote from Elizabeth O'Connor, one of their members who wrote their story back in the 70s. Church of the Savior, founded in Washington, D.C. in 1947, may well be one of the first "missional churches" and here's a quote from Elizabeth's book about that church:

When [the church] starts to be the church, it will constantly be adventuring out into places where there are no tried and tested ways. If the church in our day has few prophetic voices to sound above the noises of the street, perhaps in large part it is because the pioneering spirit has become foreign to it. It shows little willingness to explore new ways. Where it does it has often been called an experiment. We would say that the church of Christ is never an experiment, but wherever that church is true to its mission it will be experimenting, pioneering, blazing new paths, seeking how to speak the reconciling Word of God to its own age.

Source: Call to Commitment

That last line is a great statement of the church. The church is NOT an experiment- it is God's plan and community- but it will be experimenting, being pioneers in each age. That is what the missional church theology and ideal has been trying to do. It is a rich tradition. Moravians in Germany in the 1720s and '30s were doing the same. Where the church is pioneering and moving and changing to meet the changing spiritual needs around them- that is where you can find the church in mission.


Maggi Dawn explores another issue- how do you reach out in mission and work with people who, for whatever reasons, have had negative church experiences. The wounded who may have been shot by previous issues? In my experience of working with lots of different people, I have discovered that this is far more common than you might think. Here's what she had to say:

So what do we with the call of the gospel to become part of the Church, if our experience of Church thus far is just too bad to overcome? The answer to this dilemma, I believe, is not to abandon the idea of church, but to rediscover what it means for church to be fully a community. This applies equally to denominational churches that have lost their way, and to new groups that are afraid of being too committed for fear of getting hurt again. The answer in both cases is not to withdraw, but to create community. And this will not come to anyone without cost and some degree of hurt along the way, because it's in the nature of creating community that it is both challenging and expensive to the individual. A community that doesn't challenge your ego and upset your equilibrium from time to time is probably not getting to grips with the faith.

To create a community that is not just a place of care and support but one that will challenge the ego and quilibrium- sounds like something Jesus would have done. There is a lot of discussion and prayer and work and writing being done on all these things. The church is very much alive. How we see it- how the institutional aspects far together, those are big issues. But the church is very much around and filled with the Spirit.