I enjoyed this clip! This is exactly the foundation of our mission in Minnesota! As a community, we exist to develop the life of the local church through local ministry. This often includes house mass, various outreach related activities and also as a means to mediate language and cultural differences. As a community, our definition of church is not the building, but rather, the gathering of believers around the Bishop (or representative) to worship and celebrate the Eucharist. It is our opportunity to live out our baptisimal promise within the world at large rather than the four corners of a building. This is not to say that we are against the tradition of a sacred space – rather, as a community, we are able to help others find that sacred space within the selves and the places where they live. In this way, we are able to help those (as well as ourselves) find Christ in the world.
thanks Neil and Brian.will share with Santo Niño leaders.
Changing the direction of those black arrows speaks to me.
a challenging message for those of us who are largely mono cultural.
Another challenge: to invite people to come in as partners,welcoming their talents and visions as compared to inviting them to come in and be “just like us.”
This fits with the concept of churches understanding who they are (their context), how they feed their attenders, and equip them for service. I liked the video, but want more.
I LOVE it. I preside at monthly (12 Step) Recovery Services. None of the folks that come are actually “Churched”, but they are Christian, they want Communion with God and each other and they work hard to live in love. We go to Perkins instead of having coffee hour at church and have what we call a “God Talk”. I feel pressure to bring these folks into the fold of the Traditional Service and I find myself setting boundaries and saying things like, “let it BE”, because what it is, it’s GOOD.
Well, I’m not sure (now that I put all that down here), that has anything to do with the 2 minute video, but it’s what it brought to my mind anyways …
I like this. It’s simple but speaks resoundingly to our “living into” our baptismal covenant… I think I’ve compartmentalized my life into sacred and secular and this video speaks to me about this . Our call is to share our faith and we share our faith by living our faith in very real and everyday ways… programs and events are fine… but simple acts are the lifeblood of the Gospel… and talking to others about Jesus is good as well.
thanks for sharing. It feels very real life to me in where I am, where we as a church are, and it feels as if that’s the way that the energy of the people, drawn by the Holy Spirit, is going anyway, at least those communities that are whole and healthy, visionary and growing. Challenging in that I don’t know that we, certainly not always I, know how to turn those arrows very well sometimes. I think about this kind of thing a lot!
I want us to change our “slogan” to be something like “The Episcopal Church invites you” instead of “welcomes you” – still not quite right, but an action word of invitation rather than an implication that we are all sitting comfortably in our pews waiting to “you”, the guest, to show up. Then, when “you” are able to find your way through our doors, we’ll do our jobs to make you happy in our space. How about INVITING everyone to join in the mission, worship, the loving of neighbor?
Thanks for publishing this concise, attention-getting teaching tool. I’ve forwarded it to the vestry and wardens at Christ Church Austin. Wayne Schwab’s “When Members Are the Missionaries” is a great resource for teaching the missional church.
For those who are having problems trying to watch this video on Youtube, which seems to be having technical difficulties with this one, it’s also available on a similar website called Vimeo:
So please persevere and take a moment to wrestle with these ideas and what they might mean for your own faith community. It’s worth 2 minutes of your time.
Yes…simple…but oh so challenging! so many of the things we are attached to, be it .place or style of worship or that “pleasant” sense we find in being together in community can limit us in mission. Not that any one of them is by nature wrong or bad …but if they become ends in themselves they can turn us in instead of out, make us and our vision small. Great mindfood. Thanks for sharing.
The missional church vision is, of course, profoundly important. It faces a major challenge that has undermined other, previous outreach visions: We, the church, tend to be in denial about the influence of the surrounding dominant culture upon us, individually and as an institution. We internalize and manifest, subtly if not overtly, the same systemic prejudices, discriminations – and, yes, oppresions – that divide our culture. Here and there, we struggle to overcome them; but, much too often and too regularly, our sermons, our liturgies, our programs, practices and (gasp) our budgets fail to fully engage that struggle. The older habits, influenced by culture, often even have been stamped as tradition, re-shaping one of the legs of our stool.
I enjoyed this clip! This is exactly the foundation of our mission in Minnesota! As a community, we exist to develop the life of the local church through local ministry. This often includes house mass, various outreach related activities and also as a means to mediate language and cultural differences. As a community, our definition of church is not the building, but rather, the gathering of believers around the Bishop (or representative) to worship and celebrate the Eucharist. It is our opportunity to live out our baptisimal promise within the world at large rather than the four corners of a building. This is not to say that we are against the tradition of a sacred space – rather, as a community, we are able to help others find that sacred space within the selves and the places where they live. In this way, we are able to help those (as well as ourselves) find Christ in the world.
Blessings!
-jim
thanks Neil and Brian.will share with Santo Niño leaders.
Changing the direction of those black arrows speaks to me.
a challenging message for those of us who are largely mono cultural.
Another challenge: to invite people to come in as partners,welcoming their talents and visions as compared to inviting them to come in and be “just like us.”
This fits with the concept of churches understanding who they are (their context), how they feed their attenders, and equip them for service. I liked the video, but want more.
I LOVE it. I preside at monthly (12 Step) Recovery Services. None of the folks that come are actually “Churched”, but they are Christian, they want Communion with God and each other and they work hard to live in love. We go to Perkins instead of having coffee hour at church and have what we call a “God Talk”. I feel pressure to bring these folks into the fold of the Traditional Service and I find myself setting boundaries and saying things like, “let it BE”, because what it is, it’s GOOD.
Well, I’m not sure (now that I put all that down here), that has anything to do with the 2 minute video, but it’s what it brought to my mind anyways …
I like this. It’s simple but speaks resoundingly to our “living into” our baptismal covenant… I think I’ve compartmentalized my life into sacred and secular and this video speaks to me about this . Our call is to share our faith and we share our faith by living our faith in very real and everyday ways… programs and events are fine… but simple acts are the lifeblood of the Gospel… and talking to others about Jesus is good as well.
thanks for sharing. It feels very real life to me in where I am, where we as a church are, and it feels as if that’s the way that the energy of the people, drawn by the Holy Spirit, is going anyway, at least those communities that are whole and healthy, visionary and growing. Challenging in that I don’t know that we, certainly not always I, know how to turn those arrows very well sometimes. I think about this kind of thing a lot!
I want us to change our “slogan” to be something like “The Episcopal Church invites you” instead of “welcomes you” – still not quite right, but an action word of invitation rather than an implication that we are all sitting comfortably in our pews waiting to “you”, the guest, to show up. Then, when “you” are able to find your way through our doors, we’ll do our jobs to make you happy in our space. How about INVITING everyone to join in the mission, worship, the loving of neighbor?
Thanks for publishing this concise, attention-getting teaching tool. I’ve forwarded it to the vestry and wardens at Christ Church Austin. Wayne Schwab’s “When Members Are the Missionaries” is a great resource for teaching the missional church.
For those who are having problems trying to watch this video on Youtube, which seems to be having technical difficulties with this one, it’s also available on a similar website called Vimeo:
So please persevere and take a moment to wrestle with these ideas and what they might mean for your own faith community. It’s worth 2 minutes of your time.
Simply …. brilliant! A reminder of who we live for and how. Brilliant!
I like the simple video, but isn’t church membership generally declining across the board? So how do we execute?
Thank you! Thank you! A visual series of images will help in teaching . . . may it be true more and more!
Yes…simple…but oh so challenging! so many of the things we are attached to, be it .place or style of worship or that “pleasant” sense we find in being together in community can limit us in mission. Not that any one of them is by nature wrong or bad …but if they become ends in themselves they can turn us in instead of out, make us and our vision small. Great mindfood. Thanks for sharing.
The missional church vision is, of course, profoundly important. It faces a major challenge that has undermined other, previous outreach visions: We, the church, tend to be in denial about the influence of the surrounding dominant culture upon us, individually and as an institution. We internalize and manifest, subtly if not overtly, the same systemic prejudices, discriminations – and, yes, oppresions – that divide our culture. Here and there, we struggle to overcome them; but, much too often and too regularly, our sermons, our liturgies, our programs, practices and (gasp) our budgets fail to fully engage that struggle. The older habits, influenced by culture, often even have been stamped as tradition, re-shaping one of the legs of our stool.