Evangelical Left Leader Speaks at General Convention

on July 17, 2009

Read other IRD articles covering the 76th General Convention of the Episcopal Church here.

 


Brian McLaren speaks at the 2009 General Convention of the Episcopal Church.
(Jim DeLa)

A major Evangelical Left leader is calling upon religious moderates and progressives in the Episcopal Church to engage in evangelism. Preaching before the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, Brian McLaren, a prominent figure in the “Emergent Church” movement, has urged the denominational gathering to be “God’s reconciling co-workers.”

“We live in a strange time with the ‘E-word,’” said McLaren. The author of “A Generous Orthodoxy” described what he saw as reluctance to engage in evangelism, saying that in Episcopal circles it was perceived to be “tinged with colonialism or shabby televangelism.”

“If only fundamentalists evangelize in America, what future do you predict for the American religious landscape?” McLaren asked.

The Maryland pastor called gathered Episcopalians to neither be internally focused, living in ‘stained glass ghettos,’ or outsiders who have no reverence for God, but rather to be people who “plead to others for Good News that God offers amnesty to all offenders.”

McLaren identified three distractions or obstacles that he said the Episcopal Church must overcome. The first was institutional conflict.

“What good would it be to win a debate if you lose your balance?” McLaren said. “Don’t let your identity be deformed.” The pastor told the crowd to hold on to an “incarnational identity” in setting aside conflict within the church and instead focusing upon the work of reconciliation.

The second obstacle was institutional identity. McLaren said that Episcopalians should not “lodge their identity” in the pursuit of saving of a beloved institution.

“What if the best way to save an institution is not to focus on self-preservation?” McLaren asked. He proposed that Episcopalians should instead leverage their institution on saving the world through the pursuit of things like evangelism and the Millennium Development Goals.

“If you seek to do Evangelism to preserve the institution, you will be frustrated,” said McLaren. “But if you make disciples of Jesus Christ, you will succeed.”

The third obstacle McLaren identified was the ordination system in the Episcopal Church. The system “scares away from Episcopal ministry anyone with a gift for evangelism,” McLaren said. He then proceeded to share about his original discernment to pursue ministry 20 years ago, during his time in graduate school. The prominent pastor revealed that he had strongly considered pursuing ministry in the Episcopal Church, but decided against it when he felt he was faced with the choice of pursuing evangelism or ministering in the Episcopal Church.

However, McLaren praised the Episcopal structure itself, saying it had “a remarkable capacity for self-renewal.”

 

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