c. 2007 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) A friend wants to start a church. Let’s help her do it.

First, the word “church.” Should she use it? That wasn’t Jesus’ word. He envisioned “friends” going out to serve, not an institution drawing members out of the world.

It was persecution that led Jesus’ followers to gather in safe places and to focus inward. After the Christian movement got the upper hand, “church” came to mean institution, buildings, orthodoxy and rule. Are such paradigms worth perpetuating?

Second, denomination, in her case United Methodist. She wants denominational funding to get started, but does she need its overhead and brand image? The fastest-growing congregations are so-called “community” churches that avoid denomination entirely. Even within denominations, many congregations are dropping their brand name, rather than be dragged down by faded franchises and their recent history of arguing over trivialities.

Third, name. Should she give her dream a name? Or does the act of naming begin to hem in the dream? Nowadays saints’ names are out of favor, and conceptual words like “peace” and “family” are overused. That leaves location, like “Westside Community Church,” or religious agenda, like “Bible Believers’ Church.”

It also leaves _ dare we think it? _ having no name at all. Instead of focusing people’s attention on an external, suggesting permanence and structure, focus their attention on the fellowship itself, on relationships, on the bonds they form.

Fourth, space. Does a “church” need a “home”? The so-called “emerging church” movement gets by with meeting each week in whatever space is available and letting one another know by e-mail. The old rule for church startups was six acres and a down payment on a building. Do land and mortgages actually nurture healthy faith communities?

If churchgoers weren’t managing space and raising funds to pay mortgages, what would they be doing? Interesting question.

Finally, clergy. Does a faith community need an ordained pastor who serves as designated liturgist, caregiver, volunteer recruiter and leader? I’m not trying to put my friend out of a job, I’m just wondering about the traditional model. Maybe it is time for self-organizing networks, rather than centralized authority.

If my friend were to imagine an enterprise that avoided the loaded word “church,” the brand problems of denomination, the dream-inhibiting impact of name, the cost and inflexibility of space, and the vocational compromises inherent in ordination, what would she do?

I think she could do what Jesus did: teach a few people and draw them into a radically inclusive circle of friendship. Meet on hillsides, in living rooms,over meals, and talk about the in-breaking kingdom of God _ intensely relevant,transformative, troubling and yet exhilarating, not requiring persecution to have urgency, but touched by grace.

She would have to avoid the hyper-righteous tone that Christianity often displays, the holier-than-anyone attitude that supposedly feeds evangelism but actually celebrates self. As people gathered around her, she would need to remember that it isn’t about her, but about God. She would confront the tendency of community churches to be like-minded.

Her denomination would resist, of course, but putting their institutional imperatives alongside her actualized dream of Christians gathered would be good for them.

Now for your part in this. I would be interested in knowing what you think. If you have an opinion about label, denomination, name, space or clergy,I would be interested in hearing it and, unless you say otherwise, sharing your comments (not your name) with this startup pastor. Write me at tom(at)churchwellness.com.

(Tom Ehrich is a writer, church consultant and Episcopal priest in Durham, N.C. He is the author of “Just Wondering, Jesus: 100 Questions People Want to Ask,” and the founder of the Church Wellness Project. His Web site is http://www.morningwalkmedia.com.)

DSB/PH END EHRICH

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