Quote from Clark Williamson
Clark Williamson was interviewed for Disciplesworld (currently on the website). It is worth a moment or two. His answer to one question caught my attention because it captures exactly what I, and a remnant, think is the reason for the decline of our denomination.
Q: What are your hopes and fears for the future of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)?
A: Williamson: The hope has been for a long time that the Disciples could regain their early commitment to genuine theological reflection. For our founders, unity was important but honestly only one of their deepest commitments. Another one, which is seldom mentioned any more, was their insistence on the “interpretation principle” — that every Christian has the right and duty to engage in personal interpretation of the Christian faith. We eschewed creeds in order to free people to think. What has largely happened, however, is that our lack of dogma has instead had the perverse effect of giving people an excuse to refuse to think. In my view, it is our lack of theologically creative and critical reflection that lies at the heart of our decline. Faith is a way of life in which theology is not the basic fact, but to which theological thinking is critically necessary. I play this out in my theology, Way of Blessing, Way of Life (Chalice Press). And [CTS professor] Ron Allen and I provide a diagnosis of the argument about “mainstream decline” in The Teaching Minister (Westminster/John Knox), for those inclined to look into these matters.
Click here to read the entire conversation with Williamson by Brian Morse.
Greetings Rev. Davison;
I was attracted to Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) because it is a denomination steeped in tradition, but unafraid to explore new information and culture. I became an outcast in my previous denomination because I didn’t agree with the fundamentals of the denomination. Disagreeing on just a few aspects changed the way people thought of me. Disciples of Christ presented a church where all we needed to agree upon is that Jesus is the Christ, beyond that we are all on our own journey to God, going where God wants us to go in the way that the Heavenly Parent has created into each of us a uniqueness that the roads will be different. I liked that because I believe it is true. I was longing for that church, but unaware of it’s existence. All I knew about the denomination was that President James Garfield was once a minister in the church, and in watching the wonderful documentary “For the Bible Tells Me So”, that Gene Robinson was raised in the Church. After trying an MCC church (excellent, but too far to drive), Episcopal (too liturgical for me), and Quaker (surprisingly far right Republican statements) churches, I found a book at the library called “The Unofficial Guide to Choosing a Church.” There I learned of Disciples of Christ. The pastor was wonderful, but the church drove him out after about a year and a half of service.
It does seem to me after a little more than a year of attending this church that the clergy speak of a denomination that I believe is correct, but the congregation wants the same old Bible literalism and even a few want the Republican talking points. I was horrified to discover my church has a statement against allowing minorities, which of course, is insane. Church autonomy has many advatages, but it also allows denomination to maintain beliefs that are not keeping with what the denomination hiearchy is preaching.
Whenever I talk to people about my denomination, they tell me that they have never heard of it, but that is exactly what they are looking for. We have become the best kept secret in Christianity!
As a denomination I feel we must become evangelical, but progressive, ecumenical, yet distinct, tradional, yet recognizing we are in the 21st century. Follow William Sloane Coffin’s saying, “The Bible is a signpost, not a hitching post.”
We are in danger of dying out, I am one of the few Gen Xers in my church, and if we don’t do something, this wonderful denomination will simply have to merge with UCC, losing our weekly Eucharist, one of our best traits.