March 22, 2005

Open source church

I had a wonderful and lengthy conversation today with a brilliant guy who's flirting with becoming a student at Luther. On a purely selfish level I hope he will, but I'm not at all sure how well we'll resource him. He's someone who gets it, really gets the opportunities and challenges of media culture, and yet also is deeply embedded in Christian community and wants to stay in those multiple spaces. We got to talking about what "open source church" might look like, and I found myself getting pretty excited and energized. Just now I was reminded of that conversation as I browsed this article in the Economist, which is thinking about "the rise of the creative consumer." What will it mean when communities of faith are led by, and sustained through, the creative agency of their members? On some level, isn't that what Christian community at its best is about? And how will we recognize when we're creating spaces like that nowadays? Posted by hessma at March 22, 2005 08:08 PM
Comments

I recently enrolled in the Lay Missionary Training Program of my synod (I'm not sure if the name of this program is a good thing or bad thing, although my pastor tells me I'm a missionary to the Christians;-)), and I've been heartened to meet so many other laypeople who are interested in and comfortable creating and leading worship, and in creating their own ministries according to their talents. It reminds me of the campus ministry atmosphere, where students really have opportunities to bloom spiritually/creatively/vocationally. Empowering the laity through lay programs like LMTP is, IMHO, going to benefit the church immeasurably.

Posted by: LutheranChik at March 22, 2005 08:24 PM

I think your comment was SO RIGHT! And it's been fun to watch lay ministry begin to really find some voice and ground in the Lutheran context.

Posted by: Mary Hess at March 22, 2005 08:44 PM

Thanks for this link to the Economist. This is an energizing issue for churches.

Posted by: Adan at March 23, 2005 10:52 AM

I found this site based on googling the words "open source church". I will probably not return but I figured I would comment.

I am a member of the United Church of Christ, a denomination of Congregationalists and German Reformation congregations that together formed a loose unity based on Jesus' statement "That they may all be One."

In theory, each individual congregation has the flexibility to do its own thing theologically. In theory, the denomination takes in anyone just like Jesus would have. In theory, the organization is created and sustained through the initiative of its members.

The hard part is learning to live with people who disagree with and who may be very different from you politically, socially, and theologically. The UCC is not a liberal church, but some people in UCC want it to be the national liberal voice opposing Pat Robertson. As a result, leadership have taken to endorsing divisive political causes that do not sit well with many congregants and that do not lead to more unity. THere is currently a lot of tesnion, creative or not, within this denomination.

I am not trying to recruit anyone here, but I think the UCC is a good example of the pitfalls and successes of creative tension.

forums "dot" ucc "dot" org/

Also, go to wikipedia and search for
"United Church of Christ"

Posted by: Richmond T. Stallgiss at September 23, 2005 02:14 PM

Hello, I have launched a new website churchopensource.com to help churches connect with open source software. Saw this entry and thought you would be interested.

See you.

Posted by: George Algozzini at November 26, 2005 01:18 AM

Thanks George. I'd also recommend www.ekklesia-systems.com for those interested.

Posted by: D. Goodmanson at November 26, 2005 05:53 PM