Learning to preach in fog

The question was so simple that Haddon Robinson wasn't sure he had heard it correctly.

"What is Christmas?", asked the man in the next airplane seat, once he learned that he was chatting with a seminary professor. The businessman thought he knew, since he was an ordinary American who had grown up surrounded by old movies and television specials. Then he asked, "What is Easter?" That led to, "What do you mean by 'resurrection?' " Robinson described the biblical accounts of God raising Jesus from the dead.

"This man said to me, 'Do all Christians believe that?' I said, 'All Christians should believe that,' " said Robinson. "Then he said, 'That's interesting. I think I knew about Christmas. But I didn't really know about Easter.' "

This puzzled Robinson, but later something clicked. Some Christmas hymns have made it into popular culture and almost everyone hears snippets of the story year after year. But where – via mall, multiplex and mini-satellite dish – would anyone soak up Easter images? For millions of viewers the resurrection is what happens at the end of "The Matrix."

If missionaries came to America, they would immediately spot the dominant role played by mass media and, especially, visual entertainment media. They would study the moral and religious messages in mass media, seeking insights into the lives of potential converts. This is how missionaries think. But this is not how religious educators think and, thus, few clergy are taught to think like missionaries.

Robinson has been studying these issues since the mid-1950s, during his doctoral work in communications at the University of Illinois. Today, he is a distinguished professor at Gordon-Conwell Theological outside Boston and, in 1996, received national media attention when Baylor University named him one of the top 12 preachers in the English-speaking world.

Effective speakers study the forces that shape the people to whom they speak, said Robinson. Today, that means taking visual media seriously.

"Television is omnipresent," he said, in a sermon that swept from oral traditions and clay-tablet libraries to satellites and computer networks. "The way in which people get ideas, the way in which they shape their ideals, comes not because they read books, but because they see it, they visualize it. It's on television. ...

"That has shaped the way we think. ... It affects the way that we preach. It affects the heart and core of communication."

Robinson preached that sermon exactly 10 years ago, while serving as president of Denver Seminary. Little has changed. Robinson said that he knows of no seminary that requires future ministers to take a single course on how mass media affect American life.

If anything, the situation has gotten worse, he said. While the ecclesiastical elites ignore the subject, megachurches often uncritically embrace virtually every new technology. Many churches are adding expensive digital equipment in their sanctuaries and leaping into multimedia music, drama, humor and sermons illustrated with movie and TV clips. Clergy quickly discover that they're expected to use this gear in every service. The audience demands it.

"The pastor is thinking, 'Now that I have all of this stuff, where can I throw it in?'," said Robinson. "All of a sudden, rather than thinking of the most effective way to communicate a message, you're thinking about all that money you've spent. ...You're thinking about media, where before you were thinking about your message."

Robinson's advice to preachers, young and old, is that they worry less about using mass media and more about learning what is shaping the souls of their listeners. Today, every flock includes many listeners who understand little or nothing about the Bible or basic doctrines. In fact, he said, their heads and hearts are full of conflicting images and values, the result of years of spiritual channel surfing.

This was already true a decade ago. Robinson said that preachers must realize that they work in a hostile technological environment, one that "communicates with images. It doesn't come out and argue. It just simply shows you pictures, day after day after day after day. Before you realize it, in the basement of your mind, you discover that you have shifted your values and many times you've lost your faith."

The offering-plate rules

The pastor preferred to spend the moments just before the main Sunday service in prayer.

But the two men who knocked on his door were leaders in his conservative church, and they insisted that their mission was urgent. What they said ended up in one of the stacks of congregational case studies that put flesh on the sobering statistics inside John and Sylvia Ronsvalle's "Behind the Stained Glass Windows: Money Dynamics in the Church."

"We want you to stop talking about inviting other people into this church," said one of the men. "There are too many new people now. We don't know half the people who come here and there are new people in leadership positions." If the pastor kept preaching evangelistic sermons, then they vowed to leave – creating a financial crisis that would threaten the church mortgage.

They wanted their church to stay the same. That's what they were paying for.

"It's hard to understand, but we know that some people don't want their churches to grow," said Sylvia Ronsvalle, who, with her husband John, leads empty tomb, inc., in Champaign, Ill. For two decades they have worked in hands-on ministry to the poor, while also operating a small think-tank (www.emptytomb.org) that analyzes 30-plus years worth of data on giving in religious institutions, both liberal and conservative.

"Some people may not even want other members of their church to give more money and support new ministries," she added. "It's sad, but it's true. There are lots of people out there who can't see past the doors of their own church."

Right now, church workers all across America are mailing annual statements covering donations. Here is one of the unwritten laws: 20 percent of the members give up to 80 percent of the annual budget. In most cases, 50 percent or more give little or nothing. Studying these rather utilitarian issues, said the Ronsvalles, quickly leads to other questions. Why are so many content to see their congregations limp along when it comes to evangelism, missions and benevolence work? Why do people give what they give?

The answers are rarely comforting.

* Some people make major donations in order to control the institution that frames life's major transitions. As the old saying goes, people want a church when it comes time to "hatch, match and dispatch" family members. Some act as if they are purchasing shares in a beautiful building for these events and, as every clergy person knows, they care deeply about what that building looks like.

* Many people view their offerings as payment for services rendered by the staff and clergy. Perhaps they want witty and practical sermons that please their intellects or emotions. They expect clergy to visit them in the hospital and offer pastoral counseling – for free – in times of crisis. Youth pastors must heal and entertain their sons and daughters, answering awkward questions feared by parents.

* Others are buying a culture. For some members, this may be classical-quality, or even cable-television quality, music or drama. Some use the church as a social club, or the focus of ethnic identity. The church and its clergy may even be expected to carry water for a powerful family's favorite social causes, either liberal or conservative.

* Finally, the Ronsvalles' research shows that many church members sincerely see giving as a matter of faith, the natural result of gratitude and a biblical vision. The question that haunts empty tomb, inc., is how to help clergy conquer their fears of challenging members to share with others, especially in an age of plenty. Right now, charitable giving in some denominations has fallen to levels lower than in the Great Depression.

"There are people out there who are sinners and they aren't going to obey God and his Word. They're just not going to give the way they should, even though they sit in church week after week," said John Ronsvalle. "They may think the church doesn't need them to give or maybe they just don't see the need to, quote, spend their money on what the church has to offer, unquote. ...

"The question is whether they want to love other people, in the name of Jesus. In the end, that is what they have to want to invest in – the hearts and lives of others."

Boil Ashcroft in holy oil

Hours before taking his U.S. Senate oath, John Ashcroft knelt before his elderly father.

The Rev. J. Robert Ashcroft sat on a deep couch, while others stood to lay hands on his son's head in an ancient dedication rite. The frail Pentecostal patriarch – whose journey included studies at New York University and the presidency of a liberal arts college in the Ozarks – began swinging his arms, trying to get up. Ashcroft later wrote that he urged his father to stay seated.

"John," he replied, "I'm not struggling to stand, I'm struggling to kneel."

Evoking another biblical symbol, the father anointed his son's forehead with oil. In place of the traditional olive oil, someone provided vegetable oil.

The father gave his son a final blessing and then died the next day.

Media gossips offered a twisted take on this scene last week. Here's the Washington Post's spin on one of the holiest moments in the senator's life.

"Clinton White House wags have dubbed controversial attorney general nominee John Ashcroft 'The Crisco Kid'," said the "Reliable Sources" column. "We phoned the folks at Proctor & Gamble ... to ask their reaction to Ashcroft's unorthodox use of the product." A spokesperson said, "Crisco is a great moisturizer for dry skin, and people have used it as a lubricant. ... (We) prefer that people cook with it."

Cue the laugh track. Obviously, Ashcroft's supporters have not been amused as his faith has been dissected and ridiculed in the public square. But they should not have been surprised, said theologian Gabriel Fackre, of the liberal United Church of Christ.

Cruel things happen when the poetry of faith gets jammed into political headlines. Some of Ashcroft's enemies would rather talk about holy oil, speaking in tongues and Bob Jones than about his work in the U.S. Senate, the National Governors' Association, the National Association of Attorneys General or at Yale and the University of Chicago.

"Ashcroft's critics didn't like it when he told people at Bob Jones University that here in America we can say, 'We have no king but Jesus,' " said Fackre. "Of course, when he said that, he was echoing the words of the early Christians who declared that 'Jesus is Lord' and refused to say that 'Caesar is Lord.'

"So far, so good. But the problem is that when someone like John Ashcroft says that, he also feeds ammunition to all his critics who say that he wants to wed that Christian confession to his own political agenda."

Truth is, two different conversations need to take place about legal and religious issues in public life. The first is rooted in the public's right to expect officials to follow what Fackre called "universally discernible norms" of law and moral conduct. It's one thing to say the president is sinning. It's something else to say he is lying, stealing or cheating.

But Christians may "conduct a second conversation with a president who professes to be a believer," said Fackre, writing in Christianity Today. "This conversation draws upon biblical teachings to which both parties give allegiance, such as matters of repentance and forgiveness, the grace of God, Christian vocation and its responsibilities, the temptations that come with power, and the like."

Americans may be confused about all this, since these "two conversations" overlapped so often during the Clinton era that they created a bitter cacophony.

Some conservatives unintentionally aided Clinton by acting as if he could be impeached for bad theology. Clinton's team then accused his critics of neopuritanism, noted Fackre, even if their calls for his resignation were clearly part of a doctrinal debate between an evangelical president and other born-again believers. And through it all, Clinton used emotional religious language to respond to waves of legal accusations, skillfully suggesting that repentance and pastoral counseling equaled public accountability and justice.

It was a mess. Now, the war of words over Ashcroft is blurring these lines again.

"I do not know his soul," said Fackre. "But John Ashcroft must realize that the religious words he speaks to other Christians will sound totally different when his critics turn around and use them against him. This may not be fair, but that's the reality of it."

Bobos 'r US

Every Saturday, journalist David Brooks and his family can choose between three services at their synagogue in Washington, D.C.

Rabbis lead a mainstream, almost Protestant, rite in the sanctuary. Then there is an informal "Havurah (fellowship)" service led by lay people, including a 45-minute talk-back session. The erudite leaders often pause to explain why the Torah's more judgmental and dogmatic passages don't mean what they seem to mean.

Finally, throngs of young adults pack the wonderfully named "Traditional Egalitarian" service, which features longer Torah readings, a rigorous approach to liturgy and what Brooks called a "somewhat therapeutic" seminar blending spirituality and daily life.

"It can get pretty New Age-y," said Brooks, at his Weekly Standard office. "It's as if you're in an Orthodox shul and then Oprah Winfrey comes on."

It was a rabbi in Montana who gave Brooks the perfect word – "Flexidoxy" – to describe this faith. This is what happens when Americans try to baptize their souls in freedom and tradition, radical individualism and orthodoxy, all at the same time. One scholar found a Methodist pastor's daughter who calls herself a "Methodist Taoist Native American Quaker Russian Orthodox Buddhist Jew."

It doesn't make any sense, but it looks good and feels right. And that's the key to the hearts of the intellectuals, artists, politicians and entrepreneurs who came to power after the 1960s. When it comes to the culture wars, they are lovers, not fighters.

Brooks calls them "Bobos," which is shorthand for "bourgeois bohemians." Their yin-yang worldview – part '60s idealism, part '80s work ethic – now dominates academia and politics, Hollywood and, recently, Wall Street. But the Bobos, said Brooks, struggle when they try to fly solo through life's major transition times, such as marriage, birth and death.

"Can you have freedom as well as roots? Can you still worship God even if you take it upon yourself to decide that many of the Bible's teachings are wrong?", he asks, in his rollicking book "Bobos in Paradise."

"Can you establish ritual and order in your life if you are driven by an inner imperative to experiment constantly with new things? ... The Bobos are trying to build a house of obligation on a foundation of choice."

The book's spirituality chapter ends with a glimpse of "Bobo Heaven," in which a sophisticated Angel of Death leaves a materialistic superwoman to spend eternity in her perfect Montana summer house, with National Public Radio on every channel. Is this heaven or hell?

Brooks stressed that millions of Americans are sincerely struggling to live better lives, while simultaneously refusing to accept traditional religious creeds and dogmas. They have been taught, after all, that they must call their own shots, write their own creeds. He quips: "You've got to think outside the box. ... You've got to be on the edge. You've got to be outside the box that's on the edge."

For Bobos and their followers, said Brooks, the idea of "one, universal truth is not even something that they have consciously rejected. This concept is not a part of their world. They have never even really considered the idea that one religion might be true and all the others false, or even that there is one true way to approach the moral universe, and all the others are false."

But Bobos do not consider themselves moral relativists. They do make judgments. They even have creeds, said Brooks, but they are built on concerns about aesthetics, health, safety, science, self-esteem and, especially, achievement. This approach to life may even include an appreciation for "spirituality" and religious rituals. Bobos are willing to buy and consume many high-quality religious products and services.

"They have very concrete ways of faking a morality, especially when it comes to the rules that go with achievement," said Brooks. "You do whatever is best for your career and your long-term interests. ... So when it comes to religion, they want to be very positive and upbeat. It's all about encouragement and grace. They avoid the bad parts, which means the judgmental parts."

The bottom line: Does your congregation have what it takes? Can it afford to be Bobo-friendly?

Sin, safety, candor and free speech

The landscape was buried in snow, but there wasn't a ski slope in sight.

The 19,000 students gathered on the University of Illinois campus last week were asking what to do with their lives, but they weren't networking with corporate recruiters. A multi-racial rock band was shaking the concrete clamshell called Assembly Hall, but the lyrics were not MTV-friendly.

"Oh God, break our hearts," sang the standing-room-only crowd at InterVarsity Christian Fellowship's 19th Urbana Mission Convention. "For the sin in our lives ... for the sin in our land, break our hearts. We cry out. We need your help. Come back to our land."

This five-day conference drew college students from 100 lands and would have attracted CNN and USA Today if its emotional rallies and 1,200 hours of seminars had focused on sexuality, the environment or even world trade. But it isn't news when students spend Christmas break on a frozen prairie talking about world missions, racial reconciliation and poverty.

Then again, "sin" talk may soon be newsworthy. InterVarsity and other such groups are, in fact, becoming controversial. Missionaries are under attack around the world and, in America, even careful believers can get caught in crossfire from the culture wars.

Right-wing pro-lifers picketed many Urbana 2000 sessions, claiming that InterVarsity has softened its opposition to abortion. Meanwhile, InterVarsity leaders are ramping up to respond to attacks from the left by homosexual activists. These are tense times.

"We have had more challenges to our basic right to exist in campus settings during the past two years than in the previous 55 combined," said Steve Hayner, president of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship USA. "It's not just us. ... This is hitting Catholics and Muslims and others. What we are seeing is a growing challenge to religious free speech – period."

Last spring, a confidential debate inside one campus chapter lurched into the news when a lesbian student told the Tufts University student judiciary that she had, under a campus nondiscrimination policy, been unfairly denied an InterVarsity leadership role. The Tufts Christian Fellowship was first banished, then placed on probation and finally allowed to re-draft its charter to state that its leaders "must seek to adhere to biblical standards and belief in all areas of their lives."

InterVarsity created a "Religious Liberties Crisis Team" in response to this dispute and similar cases on five other campuses. Then attorney David French of Cornell Law School and Tufts InterVarsity staff member Curtis Chang produced a sobering handbook for others who will face similar conflicts.

French and Chang noted: "In a free country, individuals or groups are permitted to form schools that serve only Christians, or only Jews, or only Muslims, or only gays." For traditional Christians at private schools, the "sad reality is that there may come a time when you are no longer welcome... and there is nothing that any lawyer can do to change that decision."

After all, if Christian colleges can create lifestyle codes that support their beliefs and reject others, then secular private colleges are free to create codes that support their beliefs and reject other beliefs – such as the doctrine that sex outside of marriage is sin.

Nevertheless, believers can insist that colleges play fair when enforcing written rules, noted French and Cheng. The Tufts handbook clearly said it was university policy not to "discriminate on the basis of religion." InterVarsity could quote this early and often.

Campus ministry leaders are learning that good intentions are not enough. They must be proactive and stop trying to gloss over conflicts about doctrine, said Gregory Fung, a Harvard University graduate who currently leads the Tufts fellowship. Truth is, there's no non-controversial way to discuss subjects such as sin and repentance. It's better to state a ministry's beliefs clearly, rather than trying to play it safe.

Safety is hard to find, these days.

"We did what they asked us to do. We went to their tolerance classes," said Fung. "You think the institutions that teach tolerance won't turn around and bite you. But they do. We thought the people who taught all those classes would be tolerant. ... No way. They were determined to cure us of our intolerance."