New Church Exodus

So I watched the first of a four part series at this URL:

http://familyroommedia.com/Dropouts2.html

It basically discussed (biasedly) why the mass exodus is happening of church-goers from organized churches. I developed a few questions of my own:

Is the error the concept of an organized Church? Of an institution brought together to be the body of Christ? Perhaps. The movie would lead us to believe that.

Or is the problem a more complex one? Perhaps it is not organization that is inherently wrong (scripture would agree), but rather in this time and place (Millennium, America) we have seen the conflict of two or more ideas and practices to create, as if, the perfect storm. Perhaps the rivalry of Modernism (pragmatics, logics, catechisms, systems) and Post-modernism (Revival of arts, sensual knowledge, mystery and mysticism) has come to a head. Perhaps also the infinite competition between the many branches of Protestant Christianity has finally suffocated the tree of its fruit. Too many branches? Yes, especially dead ones.

Too many branches- See, there are so many different bodies in the Protestant side of Christianity that a few various behaviors have taken place. With all the competition in the denominations, churches became proprietary about their congregants. "Dont go to the Methodists, they are austere. We Baptists have things correct." Or, "Dont go to the Baptists, their worship is wrong, we Pentecostals have it correct." We have become a cannibalistic race as we began to devour each other with statements of exclusivity. Doctrine began to divide. And from that method. And from both, practice.
Furthermore, once your major denominations are biting each other, soon there will be conflict within the denominations as well. Churches are "successful" based upon the amount of people they have in them- period. Therefore, it becomes in the churches best interest to herd as many people as they can into the gates. They begin treating the sheep like cattle. Doing whatever program, routine, worship song, message, media, or speaker, song leader, wall color, pew cushion it takes to bring in the people. Even while inside a denomination, it became in each church's best interest to act as an individual, and no longer as a cell in a much larger body. This lead to a general disdain of one church to another, and the emergence of the "people rush" mentality where congregants are guilted into brining in friends, co-workers, and family to hear the gospel and thus become members of the church.
Is the answer progression from where the church is? Or perhaps a regression? Did the problem occur when the Catholic church became systemic and organized? Or did the problem happen when we privatized the faith?

People complain that the church is too "organized". They use works to describe the church as a machine, such words as "plastic", "fake", "institution", "wooden", "inflexible", and "routine" are all terms attributed to Church. Is this the true nature of anything organized? Or is this the result of the programs and gimmicks and niches and focus groups and targets and people pleasing that has been going on in our last century? I propose that it is the latter. Ironic it seems, that it was the lack of a backbone for all these years, the wishy-washy please like us demeanor of the Church that earned it the designation “ritualistic”.

Therefore, the solution to addressing these problems in the church is not the progression to something "post" church. Its not to reach beyond what we see into what could be. Its to reach back to what we saw, into what was. The answer is not progression, its regression. To what? Pre-reformation? Perhaps to be honest. Not doctrinally, but epistemologically. But what does that look like? The current Catholic Church? The EO church? Is it a home church? Lets consider the Scripture and think it through.

When the Churches of the First Century were referred to they were referred to by City. That indicates to me that each metropolitan area had its own Church. Now these churches, while independent one another and having their own unique personality, were also intertwined and submissive to the board of church elders, also known as the Church in Jerusalem. Well, heres the problem with what all we've discovered. It looks like almost everything we already have:
The Catholic Church exists in Rome, then each major city or state or country have respectively their own head and sovereignty, except under issues of doctrine (which is exactly how it was in the first century). Some Catholic churches do things differently from others, it depends on their leaders.
The EO church is a mystery to me, but I believe they are the same except their head is in Constantinople, or some such.
The Protestant Church is not one cohesive body. It is the most conflictive body in the history of humanity actually. All the disaster of disagreement without the perks of democracy. The diversity of bones and blood and nerves without the skin to hold it together. It is a body apart. A group torn, twisted, and at war. Hence their name, Protestant, or more basically, a protester. They protest everything, Catholics, EO's, and each other (except where alliances have been made). But even so, many of the larger denominations manage themselves exactly the same as the Catholics, and first century. Somewhere there is a group head, somewhere their is sovereignty.

So what is the problem? It seems people dont want organization, they dont like the plasticity of protestantism, and its privatizations of the faith into a business. Is Catholicism a welcome refuge then? Yes and No. While it has harnessed beautiful things like symbols and traditions (things forgotten or disdained by the eager-to-reform protestants) it is also highly criticized for being too nuanced in ritual and redundancy. While protestant churches have become too much a social club for its members, the Catholic church is not enough of one. Protestantism is frustrating because it is never full, Catholicism is boring because it is never hungry. Protestants want more more more. And if more (by their standards) is what they are looking for, they wont find it in the Catholic church. They already left that church, they dont have any intention of going back.

So where then do we regress to? The Catholic church is the oldest institution we know. What can possibly come earlier, and yet be more satisfying? What can be both Holy and obedient to the command of scripture to have a clear teacher, elders, deacons, organization....and yet be fun and frivolous enough to entertain the attention deficient minds of the Evangelicals? The answer is perilous Im afraid, because the question is wrong.

The problem as we see it, the heart of the observation, is that members in good standing who have been in the church for years and are important members of their congregations are leaving in droves. We wrongly assume this means that the "real" christians are leaving, and thus the “real” church goes with them. We seek to build it around those that leave. But this is wrong. They do not leave because they have become too Christian for even the church -progressed beyond the ability of the church to satisfy. No. They have left because, after due time, the infection of self-worship and pride has finally erupted in its final stages: Self destruction. The Evangelical church has been seeking fame and fortune for too long. Now the most patriotic of its members, so infected with this same virus, have actually turned their greed further inward. They seek to find their own personal happiness and spiritual fulfillment, at the expense of the church they once rushed to magnify.

The problem here is not that the church is missing something. Its that the church contracted something. A virus that has infected its many members, the oldest of which carry the virus in its more developed stages. What we see in the Evangelical exodus is the result of the former "seeker sensitive" and "professionalization of the church” movements. The Evangelical Church contracted a virus called Pride. It believed that the other strains of Christianity were wrong (ie everybody but that particular church) and that they had it all figured out. With no more mystery left to find in God, they had no longer to look upward in awe, but instead outward toward the hurried masses. They sought them like zealots, claiming good justifications but sorrowfully casting themselves upon the false altar of pragmatism. What we see now is the result of that Baal worship. The greed got too much, the many tumors that grew because of it became too obvious. Now the most involved in the cancer hate even themselves for having incubated it. They seek to flee the dying giant of the church, and find safety in some other thing. But they are like a virus again. Leaving their host only to infect another.

What we need is a cure. That cure is humility. That cure is penitence. That is the regression we must come to. Not the church that seeks, the church that stays. Not the church that wants, the church that has. Not the church that might be, the church that is. Slay the ideal of ambition or gain, embrace instead modesty and contentment. Are these not virtues also?

Christians got so caught up in running a race that they forgot it was also a garden. Forgot there was an element of complacency, of growing, of bearing fruit. They got so caught up in seeing new sights and turning new corners, they forgot to stretch their roots into the soil, and allow themselves to be pruned. This is not, however, merely the singular christian's fault. The new exodus Christians are the result of a disease they contracted in the pew of their church. In a sense, they are right to leave. Let them heal in quarantine, I pray. Then return to find a new church, a healthy church, a Godly church. One no longer concerned with power and prestige, under the guise of a kingdom and saved souls. Let the Church grow back its spine, stand tall for its ideals, and obey the Master Who sent it. Let it grow for Him fruit. Let this be satisfying to all. Let this be our regression.