Follow more details at his blog that still remains active.

With Great Sadness we Say Goodbye to Internet Monk is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

CTS NOT A CHARITABLE ORGANIZATION

I'll say what Bene Diction has articulated in his latest post about the scam CTS is running. Read his blog for more.

http://www.benedictionblogson.com/2010/01/15/cts-acknowledges-charity-not-legitimate-cits-media-resources-organization/

Crossroads Television System Stealing Money from ‘Givers’ is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

However, content wise, I was unimpressed, maybe because my expectations were way too high and because I'm from Canada and the conference was geared to Americans.

One Tweeter put it best:

if only the nines talked about relevant post-Christian realities... listened to 1st hour... only Skye Jethani was worth effort.

I would add Brian McLaren to that list and then, well, it was 9 minute sermonettes from people. Lots of room to grow for thetens next year in October (I'm assuming.....)

TheNines a bit of a yawn is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

It's not healthy, they spend too much time, it's like watching too much TV.

Although there is some merit to the concerns, somebody who never uses the net for information or expressions can't really enter in the dialogue of Christian spirituality and blogging. Many people are connected with new ideas and share perspectives they would otherwise not find or hear about if it weren't for regular blog contributors. So where's the balance?

I have come across two great posts, one a video, on the topic.

Internet Monk on "Blogosphere: Spirituality Assessment" and this video which sums up the important human element of socialization (which I would agree with.)

NT Wright on Blogging/Social Media from Bill Kinnon on Vimeo.

Makes sense, talking with real people should trump the time it takes to write blogs. Mind you, I wonder if the same holds true for NT Wright when he writes his awesome books? Surely these authors shut themselves in for a few months to pump out quality books?

Christian Spirituality and Blogging is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

http://www.codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx

[tags]condex sinaiticus[/tags]

Codex Sinaiticus Online is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

A very rare production was aired on Canadian TV nationally. Global Television aired a documentary called, "Hip 2B Holy," a look at evangelicals in Canada. Of course, evangelicals in Canada are quite pleased with the attention, surely it points to the success of their ways?

Personally I'm a bit disappointed at the attempt to venture into Canadian religiosity. What would have piqued my interest far more would be a documentary on the collapse of evangelicalism (as we blogged about here). This concept would have garnered far more news time and attention (good and bad), and quite frankly is a more accurate picture of the religious climate in Canada. Had this been documentary been done 10 years ago it would have been cutting edge. Since it was released today it's a bit old for people literally on the bleeding edge of 'church'.

Essentially the documentary spent time looking at two primary groups of Ontario evangelicals who moved out of the old church traditions and into more hip and happening expressions. i was drawn to the young urban pastor and less to the presbyter(?) who moved from the old church to the movie theater.

I felt as if I kept on saying throughout in response to the 'new hip' ideas the Alpha groups or churches were done was, "Oh look how many ways evangelicals can attract people to church!"

I get it, you can do what you already but using cooler music and jeans. As one pastor put it, "it's 21st century spin on Christian value", yes, I know.

The same pastor said this about one attendee in that he was, "the exact kind of person we want to attract." Well hooray, but years later he wasn't even somewhat agnostic despite his attendance? Pretty much typical Sunday only church--come in for the popcorn, but get the heck out before the noon movie showing, we'll see you next week--kind of attitude. Not to cast too much judgement here but was somebody interested in investing their lives into the couple?

The portrayal was quite accurate in this sense so thanks Kevin Newman. But the edgy questions were left out--much to my disappointment. Yes evangelicals aren't as involved politically, but they are also stagnating not growing. Being hip is cool but it doesn't make one holy, it barely even gets you more people since our emerging generations are more interested in testing and participation rather than church that looks flashy but sounds more like school.

It seemed as though there was more interest in that the Christian faith could be expressed outside of the steeple building (Alpha isn't cutting edge either BTW) then there was on the actual success of evangelicalism in Canadian culture.

An interesting addition was the voice from Ipsos Reid citing some numbers, albeit they'll be disappointed that evangelicalism won't take over Canada. I firmly believe there is no resurgence coming, in fact, decline. I also don't think they're right with their 10-15% evangelical population. Sociologist Reg Bibby pegged that number at about 8% in 2004 and I trust his numbers more.

So are evangelicals growing? Maybe marginally, they certainly do well to connect young people and have greater loyalty throughout the family, but I certainly wouldn't claim a movement or resurgence is on our hands.

One thing is certain, evangelicals know the world around them is changing but they haven't figured out how. We're bent on creating Irresistible environments because obviously God is only interpreted and present when clergymen are around (that was sarcasm).

For the most part there is an assumption for evangelicals that they are dealing with a Christianized Canada. That is: cool presentation + seeker sensitive attitude (movie theater, flash, videos, to attract while you sit there and take it) = a sensible product to be consumed.

DUDE--this isn't the 80's. Just cause you have electric guitars, video, and a blog doesn't mean a darn thing anymore. It's great to be current, but useless to do what you're supposed to, make disciples. Maybe you'll grow through addition of dechurched people, but fundamentally my sense we need to do less about cool and more about raw and probably already existent personal relationships. Not ones with Christ, but ones with our friends/networks.

Hopefully there is a part 2 on this series that talks about the decline rather than the 'growth'. I'll be happy to contribute as the voice of the actual 'next wave' of evangelicalism (we can start by dropping evangelical ).

What did you think of the documentary?

ADD: The blogosphere is picking up on it which is cool, even atheists are chiming in.

Why It’s Not Hip to be Holy is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

There was zeal, respect, attitude, leadership, prestige, vision, attributed with these companies, but their inability to innovate and recognize obvious cultural changes contributed to the demise of these once great companies.

Christian denominations (I was going to pick on evangelicals, but my sense this crosses denominational boundary) flush with cash today are a dying breed, and in a few years time they too will face, if they haven't already, the painful realization they are not only out of touch, but irrelevant to the culture around them.

What's the cause of the eventual or current decline? Taking a gospel message and translating it into a language only they can understand.

Conservative Christians are notorious for forgoing their own message of love and reconciliation to confront the lack of morality in society. It's been said the Trinity of Father-Son-Holy Spirit has been replaced with the new conservative right wing Trinity of Homosexuality-Abortion-Evolution. Furthermore, rather than worship of Jesus Christ as their model and hero, conservative have placed the Bible (confused with 'the Word') on an unhealthy pedestal.

Solution? There needs to be a literal about shift regarding the churches interaction with culture. Rather than creating parallel culture or reacting negatively to existing culture, we need to learn how to interpret a gospel message of redemption within a language those connected in our networks can understand.

That does not suggest we 'become like the world', but rather point people into the r eign of God. But the only way to accomplish this task is to simply draw into relationship first. The first interaction people in our post-Christendom world should have with God, Church, Jesus, whichever, is not the physical church building ("hooray they came to church on Sunday!"), but rather its community.

This isn't really news to anybody who's been in church for a while, but it does lend to the notion that it's more important to connect with our neighbors rather than forcing them to interpret our church community. To put it in another way, most churches are attractional, which means the point of the existence of the church is to get as many people into the building Sunday for service. Not only is this counter intuitive to the Great Commission, it also forces those who are not connected into anything church (the post-Christendom world which is ever growing around us) to interpret our culture within. We force new church visitors to do the cross-cultural work--and yes, it is very CROSS CULTURAL stepping foot into any church.

Time to see the err of our ways before it's too late. The fundamental posture of our popular church buildings/communities needs to change. No longer are people interested in sitting silently while listening to someone's exposition for 45 minutes. Today we commission people (not just pastors) to exist for the sake of God's mission to redeem humanity.

How that looks, it's up to your and based on your network/voice.

By the way, an attractional church CANNOT attempt to be missional without changing their posture. Meaning they can't on one hand (like I heard this past week at a church) exhort lazy people to get connected into God's mission and have 'spiritual discussions' (this is a pathetic stat to count but that's another discussion for another time), while on the other hand make a distinction between pastors and laity.

It will hurt, but a massive shift is required in order to connect with an emerging and dominant post-Christendom culture. The change is absolutely necessary not only because of Kingdom implications, but unlike GM or Chrysler, there is no second chance to recover from 'spiritual bankruptcy'. When you pull the plug on a dying and ineffective church nobody outside will shed a tear or take notice.

That means ineffective and blind leaders will cease to exist, replaced instead with more vibrant, perhaps smaller, and focused communities looking to journey with each other along God's redemption story for humanity.

[tags]missions, attractional, church, evangelicals[/tags]

How Christian Denominations are Like GM and Chrysler is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

Full image here.

It's a cool little image, but if not interpreted properly it's misleading regarding the overall strength of evangelicals. I'll comment specifically on Canada.

You see all these dots, apparently those are evangelicals. Whether they are one or 100 I'm not sure, but I can certainly tell you this image feigns the strength of evangelicals.

There's a lot of dark in Canada, assuming evangelicals are the only bearers of light, which they aren't. However, you'll see a nice Bible Belt brightness across the prairies. Reginald Bibby, sociologist in Canada, has done a number of surveys on numbers. Protestant Conservative comprise around 8% of all Canadians.

Let's pick a conservative city, say Calgary or Edmonton in Alberta. Assuming the 8% conservative number, there are about 200 000 Protestant Conservatives in Alberta, a province of about 3.35 million people. Certainly nothing to slouch at, but are these conservatives really doing anything in the community other uttering eternal condemnation (or doing nothing at all?)

If you look at the map, pick any city, you'll probably have a nice bright dot. Hooray, what does it mean? Well nothing other than at least one (or maybe a group) of evangelicals are in city. Nothing about their effectiveness, nothing about their value in the community, nothing on whether they are working to redeem creation around them.

Too bad you can't make a graph of those things, I surmise it would be far, far darker.

Cool Image of Evangelicals Around the Globe Misleading is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

Apparently Obama is the anti-Christ warm act. Huh, do any Christian still believe in this garbage? Tim lahaye got rich off of stupid conservative Christians. Bugger off when you spout this rhetoric, it's not even worthy of discussion, which is totally no post-modern, but when you're position is so blatantly contentious and lacks any morsel of thought you deserve to be ignored.

BTW, Pomotheo.com will relentlessly, in the spirit of jest, make fun of any graduate from the Bob Jones clown 'University'.

[tags]tim lahaye, antichrist, left behind, conservatives[/tags]

Why the World Hates Fundamentalist Christians is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080330/islam_rcs_080330/20080330?hub=TopStories

Vatican Says Islam #1 – Head Still up Butt is a post from: PomoTheo - Missional Perspectives