Problem Solving Christianity

[Pages:1]E Blast April 12, 2019

Problem Solving Christianity

I have recently begun to read Fr. Richard Rohr's groundbreaking new book, The Universal Christ: How A Forgotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, Hope For, And Believe. I am looking forward to reading and inwardly digesting this new book. Fr. Rohr and others from the Center For Action and Contemplation also have a podcast that focuses on the book. In the first podcast Rohr, while talking about Christ, shares the problem with current Christianity which he refers to as Problem Solving Christianity in which the Church has moved away from its moorings that centers on seeing Christ present in all things. Instead, the Church has been focused on everything but the presence of Christ. We, at the Episcopal Church of Saints Andrew and Matthew, are not immune from practicing this problem solving approach to faith.

Many years ago, my former bishop from Maine, Steve Lane introduced a new lens to see how the Church is in the world. He referred to this new lens as adaptive change. Instead of focusing on what the Church does not have, he encouraged parishes of Maine to be out in their communities engaged in the life that was happening outside the walls of the Church. I think Fr. Rohr is getting at something by naming what is happening in much of American Christianity today. When we are focused on Problem Solving we tend to focus on scarcity. We need more money and more people and then we will have faith. Churches that continue to pursue this way of "mission" will not be around much longer. Rohr and others encourage the Church to return to the teaching of Jesus Christ: to love God with all your heart, mind and strength and to love our neighbors as ourselves which opens us to see that everything belongs. It has been my experience that to see Christianity as a way to solve a problem does not open us to the mystery that is God's love for all things.

This Sunday we begin Holy Week and I invite you to walk as a community with Jesus through the dirty and grungy streets of Jerusalem to the rugged stone of Calvary. Jesus was not tempted to solve a problem but rather he was modeling the way we are to live today. To give ourselves away without counting the cost so that we might live as sons and daughters of the living God who moves in us and through us out into the world.

Peace,

Fr. David

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