March 1 Cohort: "Belonging Precedes Believing"

We will be meeting at Charlie Browns @ 9pm on March 1st. We welcome you to the conversation.

Topic: "Belonging Precedes Believing"
If you've read much by Brian McLaren or heard him speak, you've probably heard him use the phrase "Sometimes, belonging must precede believing." We're going to talk about that statement. If any of you have McLaren's book More Ready Than You Realize - please bring that with you and try to have read Chapter 11: The Idea of Playing for and through God. Here is a section out of that chapter to get you thinking:

"I am fortunate that the church I am privileged to serve understands something that too few churches understand: Sometimes belonging must precede believing. In other words, unless we let not-yet-Christians enter and participate in the Christian community, many of them won't becomes Christians...Many of our denominations arose or redefined themselves during the modern period (say between 1500-2000), when theological controversy and competition, combined with a penchant toward control (all in an environment where modern Christianity provided the dominant worldview), reinforced what I call "motivation by exclusion." Motivation by exclusion says something like this: We're on the inside, but you're on the outside. We're right, and you're wrong. If you want to come inside, then you need to be right. So, just believe right, think right, speak right, and act right, and we'll let you in.

Again, there were reasons why this line of thinking predominated in modern churches, but I think for those of us living and serving in a postmodern world, we need to move beyond motivation by exclusion. Our motivation by acceptance will say something like this: We are a community bound together and energized by faith, love and commitment to Jesus Christ. Even though you don't yet share that faith, love, and commitment, you are most welcome to be with us, to belong here, to experience what we're about. Then, if you are attracted and persuaded by what you see, you'll want to set down roots here long-term. And if you don't, you'll always be a friend."

This conversation is especially intriguing for those of us who may enter into ministry settings where membership is something important, and you have to become a member when you're baptized, and you have to 'technically' be a baptized Christian to partake of the Eucharist. This conversation will be very interesting as we begin talking about leadership, the sacraments, etc. Come join us!

We're still here!!!

Hey Friends...

I just got the Emergent/C e-mail and saw that the Princeton Emergent Cohort was listed as a functioning cohort. And we are definitely in the conversation! I got an e-mail from a person asking if we were still active since our most recent post is from 2005. The ball was dropped as far as keeping things updated.

This cohort is mostly led by students at Princeton Theological Seminary and because of our class schedule we have not done much lately with regard to the Cohort (Princeton Seminary has a really weird calendar which bascially splits the month on January into week long sprints...which leaves us extremely busy, tired, and scattered).

We are back in our Spring semester and we hope to have a Cohort meeting shortly. There are a few people from Princeton who will be attending the upcoming Theological Conversation at Yale Divinity School and that will probably get our motivation back up.

This blog is still active. It is still the place to get information about cohort meetings. If you are interested in being on our e-mail list...send an e-mail to me at joshua.erickson@ptsem.edu

Look forward to hearing from you!

In Christ,
Josh