ELCA, A Sinking Ship?
From time to time it is nice to record my thoughts, no matter how insubstantial they are, after it has been construed. And maybe, in a few years, I can always look back and laugh at my nonsensical blathering. Maybe it will have commemorable values. For those of you who are reading my blog, feel free to plagiarize any ideas of mine for your papers. Everything I publish here will be for the public use, but it comes without warantees of any sort.
I am publishing this following blog in order to explain to myself about why I think ELCA is shrinking. I have been thinking about this over the summer without reading any books. The of decline of church membership is very ostensible. The large shrinkage of church income is a well known fact. Should I really pursue the ELCA ordination? It is not only time consuming, but it feels like jumping onto a sinking ship. Is it possible to reverse the decline? It is possible but not likely, especially since those who belong to the Lutheran leadership ranks are very defensive whenever I bring up the subject. All I hear are excuses to justify their inactions and indolences, but the prospect of change is perhaps even more terrifying. Eventually ELCA has to get their collective asses together or face extinction. Anyways, I will cut to the chase and explain the problems and perhaps a few remedies to end the spell.
I. The Meaning of Decline
What is the underlying meaning behind this decline? I think it means that ELCA has failed to connect with majority of the Christian population. I don't think the validity of the theology has anything to do with it. If church growth is the best indication of the validity of a religion, than Mormon Christianity is the most valid religion of all religions! The fact that R&B and rap music is better than classical music doesn't mean it is a better form of music. The fact that American idol has better ratings than educational programs doesn't mean that it is a better program. Evangelical Christianity is popular simply because it is popular among unintellectual and uncritical messes of believers. I'll have more to say about this in the future.
II. Church Culture & Structure
ELCA is marked by eurocentricity. What I mean by that is that the whole Lutheran tradition is created in Europe and was brought over to the US via the immigrants mostly from Scandinavia and Germany. The church design, culture, liturgy and style of worship are all somewhat similar no matter what part of the world the churches are located. Since Lutheran is the state religion in those countries, the denomination has the monopoly of the Christian faith. It is a well known fact in economics that whenever an entire industry is owned by an monopoly, it is very slow to respond to the needs of its consumers. For the first few generations of immigrants in the US, it was politically correct to go to church every Sunday. The choices about which type of church to attend were larged based on the sects where they originated from - language, nationality, culture, worship style, looks of buildings, etc... There was no need for evangelism.
However, the time has changed. The Scandivian / German community has disappeared because of cultural assimilation and population migration and mixing instigated by the economy. In the past, people's lives are centered about their community. Today people's lives are centered around the economy. In today's generation, offsprings of Lutheran immigrants neither are compelled to go to Lutheran churches nor are compelled to go to any church at all. Today in the midst of free religion, ELCA find themselves in competition with not only other religions but also other Christian denominations. Fully adapted to American culture, Evangelicals have flourished while the Lutherans are perishing.
ELCA is more centralized. On the other hand, Evangelical churches are more localized and more likely to adapt to the regional demands. If you don't like one Baptist church, you go to a different one. If you don't like an ELCA church, most of them are nearly all the same.
Evangelicals target their audience and fulfill their needs. ELCA say we will give you *what we think* you need, (and not what you think you need) and we will do what we think is the best for you. (and not what you think is best for you)
Because ELCA does not have emotional services, they are unable to turn people into "worship junkies" or "worship addicts" - those who need to get their weekly doses of emotional kicks and fixes. Because ELCA actually interprets "born again" correctly, they are unable to have power over and manipulate people's lives. Because ELCA does not provide entertainment through rock and roll music, stand up comedy on the pulpit, emotional sermons, and charismatic razzle dazzles, going to services become more like a task and less like a carnival.
Lutheran congregations are bad at missions, and individually Lutherans are terrible at sharing their faith with others. Evangelicals on the other hand are indeed growing. Are they converting new believers? Well, the Mormons and JW are growing. Muslims are growing, and so are Buddhists and Wiccans. Scientology and New Age are growing. Atheists are Agnostics tripled their population in last 10 years. The answer is no. Percentage-wise all other religions are growing, and Christianity is experiencing, at best, stagnation. This means the Evangelicals are not converting new believers but instead are converting existing believers from mainline denominations. ELCA is losing members to other denominations like Baptists, E free, or Assemblies of God.
III. Theology
Most Midwestern Lutherans as far as I know stay closely with the Scripture and Orthodoxy and with bona fides. Some Lutherans in the two Coasts have earned the reputation of being too liberal, but that is not the case in the Midwest. The Lutheran mode of bible interpretation is too difficult for the common people. If it is too difficult, the bible adds NO VALUES to their faiths. I mean people are told that in order to interpret the bible correctly, they need to have an adequent profficiency in the background history and culture, they need to think inductively and look for metaphors, allegories, and symbols, they need to know a thing or two about textual criticism, and to really understand the text they need to know biblical languages. Evangelicals, on the other hand, make things really easy. They believe that any high school dropouts should be able to pick up a bible and understand it perfectly. There is only one way to understand the bible, which has only one right interpretation - the meaning that is the most literal and obvious.
In the end, it just seems to me that the Lutherans require trained professionals to tell them what to think.
IV. Professional Clergies
It is a huge problem. This is something which I alluded to in one of my previous posts. I am going to cut the length of this blog short and write more about it in the future.
I am publishing this following blog in order to explain to myself about why I think ELCA is shrinking. I have been thinking about this over the summer without reading any books. The of decline of church membership is very ostensible. The large shrinkage of church income is a well known fact. Should I really pursue the ELCA ordination? It is not only time consuming, but it feels like jumping onto a sinking ship. Is it possible to reverse the decline? It is possible but not likely, especially since those who belong to the Lutheran leadership ranks are very defensive whenever I bring up the subject. All I hear are excuses to justify their inactions and indolences, but the prospect of change is perhaps even more terrifying. Eventually ELCA has to get their collective asses together or face extinction. Anyways, I will cut to the chase and explain the problems and perhaps a few remedies to end the spell.
I. The Meaning of Decline
What is the underlying meaning behind this decline? I think it means that ELCA has failed to connect with majority of the Christian population. I don't think the validity of the theology has anything to do with it. If church growth is the best indication of the validity of a religion, than Mormon Christianity is the most valid religion of all religions! The fact that R&B and rap music is better than classical music doesn't mean it is a better form of music. The fact that American idol has better ratings than educational programs doesn't mean that it is a better program. Evangelical Christianity is popular simply because it is popular among unintellectual and uncritical messes of believers. I'll have more to say about this in the future.
II. Church Culture & Structure
ELCA is marked by eurocentricity. What I mean by that is that the whole Lutheran tradition is created in Europe and was brought over to the US via the immigrants mostly from Scandinavia and Germany. The church design, culture, liturgy and style of worship are all somewhat similar no matter what part of the world the churches are located. Since Lutheran is the state religion in those countries, the denomination has the monopoly of the Christian faith. It is a well known fact in economics that whenever an entire industry is owned by an monopoly, it is very slow to respond to the needs of its consumers. For the first few generations of immigrants in the US, it was politically correct to go to church every Sunday. The choices about which type of church to attend were larged based on the sects where they originated from - language, nationality, culture, worship style, looks of buildings, etc... There was no need for evangelism.
However, the time has changed. The Scandivian / German community has disappeared because of cultural assimilation and population migration and mixing instigated by the economy. In the past, people's lives are centered about their community. Today people's lives are centered around the economy. In today's generation, offsprings of Lutheran immigrants neither are compelled to go to Lutheran churches nor are compelled to go to any church at all. Today in the midst of free religion, ELCA find themselves in competition with not only other religions but also other Christian denominations. Fully adapted to American culture, Evangelicals have flourished while the Lutherans are perishing.
ELCA is more centralized. On the other hand, Evangelical churches are more localized and more likely to adapt to the regional demands. If you don't like one Baptist church, you go to a different one. If you don't like an ELCA church, most of them are nearly all the same.
Evangelicals target their audience and fulfill their needs. ELCA say we will give you *what we think* you need, (and not what you think you need) and we will do what we think is the best for you. (and not what you think is best for you)
Because ELCA does not have emotional services, they are unable to turn people into "worship junkies" or "worship addicts" - those who need to get their weekly doses of emotional kicks and fixes. Because ELCA actually interprets "born again" correctly, they are unable to have power over and manipulate people's lives. Because ELCA does not provide entertainment through rock and roll music, stand up comedy on the pulpit, emotional sermons, and charismatic razzle dazzles, going to services become more like a task and less like a carnival.
Lutheran congregations are bad at missions, and individually Lutherans are terrible at sharing their faith with others. Evangelicals on the other hand are indeed growing. Are they converting new believers? Well, the Mormons and JW are growing. Muslims are growing, and so are Buddhists and Wiccans. Scientology and New Age are growing. Atheists are Agnostics tripled their population in last 10 years. The answer is no. Percentage-wise all other religions are growing, and Christianity is experiencing, at best, stagnation. This means the Evangelicals are not converting new believers but instead are converting existing believers from mainline denominations. ELCA is losing members to other denominations like Baptists, E free, or Assemblies of God.
III. Theology
Most Midwestern Lutherans as far as I know stay closely with the Scripture and Orthodoxy and with bona fides. Some Lutherans in the two Coasts have earned the reputation of being too liberal, but that is not the case in the Midwest. The Lutheran mode of bible interpretation is too difficult for the common people. If it is too difficult, the bible adds NO VALUES to their faiths. I mean people are told that in order to interpret the bible correctly, they need to have an adequent profficiency in the background history and culture, they need to think inductively and look for metaphors, allegories, and symbols, they need to know a thing or two about textual criticism, and to really understand the text they need to know biblical languages. Evangelicals, on the other hand, make things really easy. They believe that any high school dropouts should be able to pick up a bible and understand it perfectly. There is only one way to understand the bible, which has only one right interpretation - the meaning that is the most literal and obvious.
In the end, it just seems to me that the Lutherans require trained professionals to tell them what to think.
IV. Professional Clergies
It is a huge problem. This is something which I alluded to in one of my previous posts. I am going to cut the length of this blog short and write more about it in the future.
posted by doulos theou | 4:42 PM
1 Comments:
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Post a Comment
<< Home