The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 8

If you are interested in learning more about how the forces of a metropolis affect the ministry of local churches, let me know and I'll take you out for coffee at my Starbucks to talk. And if you really want to learn more, I suggest Gibson Winter's book. Very illuminating and disturbing.

The churches have had notable successes in the growing suburbs; they have suffered dismal failures in the central areas of the metropolis.

Religiousness or irreligiousness in the United States will depend upon the development of ministries in the metropolitan areas. This is where the masses of the population of the United States will work out their destinies in the coming generation; this is where the destiny of the nation will be decided for better or worse.

-- The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, pg 15

A whole new vista has opened up to me concerning the cultural context of Anchor's facility location in the central area of Fort Wayne. Does the location of a church facility affect the capacity of your ministry, of who will be part of that ministry? Yes. What is the significance of thriving suburban churches and struggling urban churches? A matter of leadership and maturity? God's blessing and wise moral choices? What are the dangers of being a prosperous suburban church? What are the riptides tearing away at urban churches?

These are all significant questions that have surfaced for me as I worked my way through Winters immensely insightful book on the "trenchant dilemma of American Protestantism - its severance from the urgent needs and challenges of the metropolis - and a program for its revitalization."

Sunday marks eleven years as pastor of Anchor; our facility is located about ten blocks from Main Street Fort Wayne. It's a deteriorating neighborhood. How does a church be for the neighborhood while also resisting the deteriorating trend of its location? What are the forces at work in our neighborhood (and throughout the city) that shape the lives of its citizens? And what are churches to do about it?

Winters contends that the core ministry of the church is one of reconciliation (taking a cue from St. Paul in a letter of his to the Christ-followers in the totally fractured city of Corinth). I resonate with that theme of reconciliation as being a crucial element of what constitutes the worth of a church in its neighborhood. But how deep and how far does the reconciliation need to go? Reconciliation not only with God and other Christians, but reconciliation with other races, with those in a different class of society, with those of a different colored collar?

The metropolis, where the masses of Americans now live, dominates the life and culture of the United States. Dr. Winter's analysis shows that Protestantism has not shaped itself to meet the challenges. The inner city, deserted by the churches, grows more desperate under pressure of poverty, crime, and racial discrimination. Suburban churches, preoccupied by the concerns of middle-class domesticity, fail to deal with the total context of their constiuents' lives.

"The choice confronting the churches today is whether to continue ministering to fragments of a society or to reform their ministry in order to participate in the whole life of the metropolis."

This new knowledge is going to take a while to work its way through me, but already there are some important implications that come to mind for Anchor's future ministry:

* first - connect with as many other churches as possible within our neighborhood and in the suburbs.

* second - push the work of reconciliation further, not just for marriages and in parenting, but between races, between classes of people, for criminals, for the impoverished, the mentally disabled, the elderly.

* third - daily trust God as we walk in the Same Spirit as Jesus to do and be good news to the deteriorating city - both downtown and in the suburbs.

* fourth - research, research, research; get wisdom; deal with reality of situation for people, individuals, churches, cities, economic forces, cultural powers, metropolitan currents.

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 7

The central concern is ministry and mission: in metropolitan terms today, this means participation in the whole and breaking through the mosaic of insulated enclaves which shatter the public life of the metropolis. This is the only valid criterion for testing any reformation in Protestantism; its formative power will be tested by its assumption of responsibility for the whole.

Church planning, which has emerged in recent decades as a way of allocating new missions in efficient and co-operative ways, has been extremely useful as far as it has gone. Unfortunately, church planning has been preoccupied with extending the organization church in suburban and satellite areas.

Church planning, however, will fulfill its promise only when it regards participation in the whole metropolitan area as its essential principle, its first task is the breakthrough of insulated enclaves within Protestant religious life.

The metropolis is a mission field not because there are unchurched people but because there is no public ministry. By treating the metropolis as a Christian culture in need of supplementary church construction on the periphery, we are seeking to escape from the missionary task.

Missionary strategy must concern itself with the whole. In other other way can it adequately express the Gospel of God's reconciling work for man.

This analysis has offered up incontrovertible evidence that the metropolis is a religiously broken, fragmented cluster of insular pockets estranged from one another. Its religious life is split through the middle by the schism - a truly satanic division - and its religious organization upholds social class identities rather than the universal identity of those who are interdependent in Christ.

We have, in fact, the strategy of an established church in a missionary situation.

The church proclaims a universal identity largely by involving its membership in experiences of obligation toward other people in the congregation. For many people today, church membership means the opportunity to see the same people they meet at Kiwanis or the country club.

The church will guide the metropolitan community toward the meaning of community when church members transcend the social, racial, and economic barriers that inhibit communication.

These members may represent different local fellowships, since housing in the metropolis is more and more confined in particular neighborhoods to single social class levels, and no local fellowship can be all-inclusive. Their church membership, nevertheless, will be proof of their determination to disregard social barriers; it will mean willingness to assume responsibility for financial and personal ministry in areas of radically different social and cultural background.

The church communicates essentially by what it is rather than what it says.

The Church speaks, as does Her Lord, from the reality of Her life rather than the imagination of Her heart.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 202-204

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 6

The renewal of public responsibility and the creation of metropolitan community are two sides of the same coin. Each is essential to the other.

When the churches suffered a breakdown of community as Christian people, the metropolitan area was deprived of the sustaining power of a faith that embraced the concerns of the whole. The collapse of the public sphere was almost inevitable without a community to represent the whole, for the free play of economic interests fragmented the metropolis, and no countervailing power represented the common good.

What are these issues and problems?

1) Slums are growing and they are increasingly the habitat of minority groups who are isolated and discriminated against, both in terms of housing and in terms of economic opportunities.

2) Social tensions are reaching the explosive states and we continue, doggedly, to ignore causes in favor of treating the results (e.g., juvenille delinquency).

3) Social and political communication is almost at a standstill as the idea of responsibility is lost midst the welter of consumer -oriented propaganda.

4) The concentration of urban populations is raising sever problems of water supply and disposal of wastes.

5) Open spaces are increasingly difficult to preserve, and the implications of this for food supply, standards (material) of living, economics of land development, and aesthetics are keeping many people awake at nights.

There is a grim physical reality to the metropolis. From time to time we make pitiful token gestures toward its "problems." But no one guides us toward a meaning of community which comprehends more than profit taking and congeniality. Will the Church fill this emptiness in our society?

To provide guidance toward metropolitan community the Church can:

1) affirm community by forming a ministry to the whole metropolis.

2) offer a vision and experience of metropolitan community by exemplifying a community.

3) inform the metropolitan struggle for community with its own prophetic concern for the common good of the metropolitan area.

The deformation of Protestantism came about by the severing of its ministry from participation in the whole of metropolitan life; the reformation of Protestantism will come about through the participation of its ministry in the whole and representation of the whole community in the communities of Protestant faith.

The renewal in Protestantism will be tested by the extent of its formative power - whether it can generate inclusive ministries to the whole metropolis. Many pastors and laymen are ready to participate in the whole life of the metropolitan area. Having tasted the emptiness of an insular congregation, they are searching for opportunities to share responsibility with other pastors and congregations.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 200-201

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 5

The signs of renewal in Protestantism are striking.

The insights of developmental psychology and group processes are being successfully applied to the teaching task of the Church. Pastoral care has benefited from the perspective of depth psychology, enabling churches to respond magnificently to the infinite problems created by industrial development.

The most striking fact about contemporary Protestantism is the re-emergence of lay responsibility. The lay movement is a strong attempt to counteract the shallow activism of the organization church and to search for meaning and direction in a mass society. Many clergy have shied away from this lay movement for fear that it would disrupt the smooth pattern of church life, but those who have nurtured it have found new support for their ministries in sharing their task with laymen.

Two other signs of renewal can be noted in Protestant life. New ministries to the nonresidential structures of society are emerging: ministries to hospitals, universities, industries, and, more recently, to political organizations; furthermore, a ministry to the communal organizations of the cities has appeared in the form of church planning.

The significance of these ministries, at present, is their concern with the structural problems of a mass society. Their potential power for renewal is considerable, since they signify the formation of a public ministry.

The organization of faith expresses or denies the Word to the world. When it expresses the Word, it channels the ministry into mission and servantship.

Renewal of mind is essential to the creation of a ministry to the whole metropolis; renewal of mind through the Spirit is the essence of life in the churches and ministry is the vehicle of that life in the world.

When the forces of renewal now present in the churches begin to shape the ministry, Protestantism will become the central force for renewal in metropolitan life.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 198-200

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 4

The deformation of the ministry is a religious symptom of the sickness of industrial society.

Many successful pastorates exist under these circumstances, many faithful and devoted lives emerge from them; but the saints of the organization church are apt to appear despite the program rather than because of it.

Notwithstanding the piety of individual pastors and laymen, Protestantism as a whole was vulnerable to the centrifugal forces of metropolitan life. The emphasis on voluntary congregations and individual piety made Protestantism a prey to the distorting forces.

Each new stage of metropolitan disorder will manifest itself within religious institutions unless the churches assume a formative role in their ministry to the metropolis.

This analysis of Protestantism could be summarized as a loss of contact between the churches and the community as a whole.

The choice confronting the churches today is whether to continue ministering to fragments of society or to reform their ministry in order to participate in the whole of life of the metropolis.

It is a difficult choice, since the losses will be great in either direction; ministry to parts means continued frustration and the neglect of the genuinely religious concerns; participation in the whole means organizing a new form of the Protestant ministry.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 196-197

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 3

Industrial life drives the lower classes into apathy, making them a prey to psychosis and religious escape; competition on the economic ladder drives the middle classes into frenetic attempts to demonstrate their adequacy, which leads to despairing emptiness.

The apathy of the lower classes renders them inaccessible to the ministries of organization churches, for the manipulation of words and people in the organization churches is alien to lower-class life.

This organizational style of religious life, on the other hand, is deadeningly familiar to the manipulated middle classes. Thus, the cleavage within industrial society is mirrored in the styles of Protestant religious life.

Pastors experience the deformation of religious life most acutely in their sense of alienation from the significant spheres of contemporary life. Their ministries certainly touch the sufferings of private life - illness, death, familial estrangement - but they seldom intersect with the collective structures that shape the lives of their congregations.

The pastor runs an ambulance service, so to speak - an important and indispensable aspect of the Church's ministry; but his services in this respect are performed without ever contacting the powers that shape the destiny of the metropolis and the world.

Religion is now relegated to the sphere of personal emotional adjustment.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 195-196

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 2

This preoccupation with [the role of churches in the renewal of the metropolis] arises... because of the seeming helplessness before the forces of metropolitan blight.

The churches are essential at this juncture in metropolitan development, for they can best represent the interests of the whole in the midst of conflicting economic interests, and can speak out most strongly for life and human values. The churches will fail to bring about a renewal of the metropolis, however, unless they first put their own house in order.

We have been concerned with the renewal of human life in the metropolis - the struggle of the immigrants and newcomers, the alienation of the Negro population, and the frantic search for traditions and security among the middle classes. Such concerns may seem nonreligious or irrelevant to the main stream of American Protestantism, which holds the object of religious concern to the individual piety and spirituality. This religious tradition assumes that preaching the Gospel leads directly to the reconciliation of society; the Church's work, therefore, is to spread the Gospel and let social problems take care of themselves.

The only answer to this pietistic tradition is that the Gospel embraces the whole of human life and society. Man's life in society is an interdependent web. Personal immorality is no more nor less accessible to spiritual renewal than racial discrimination in housing.

A narrow spirituality refuses to recognize the interdependence and wholeness of life; its concern rejects involvement, and its preoccupation with individual piety derives from the false assumption that the individual soul is more open to change than the social institutions.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 192-193

The Suburban Captivity of the Churches - 1

Citizens of the metropolis realize that their future and the lives of their children depend upon the creation of a safe, healthy, environment in the metropolitan area. The exodus to suburbia has failed to check the spread of blight. There is no retreat from the disorder and deterioration which plague metropolitan society.

The metropolis is an interdependent community, even though it attempts to conduct its private life in independent enclaves.

Somehow, and before too long, the metropolitan areas must face the task of rebuilding their local communities and integrating these communities in a public sphere; this means the creation of a community in the metropolis in which respect for all citizens is expressed through access to housing and interclass associations.

The churches bear a heavy burden of responsibility for the failure of the metropolis to become a community.

This interpretation of religious responsibility extends to all phases of metropolitan development - the ghettos, housing inequities, school deficiencies in slum areas, exploitation of newcomers by real estate and business interests, the disregard for life that permits residential areas to become highways, and the inadequate fire inspections in slum areas.

The churches are not alone in this responsibility, of course, but they bear a large share of the burden. And the responsibility remains theirs whether they concentrate their ministry in the satellites or remain in the central city.

~ The Suburban Captivity of the Churches, Gibson Winter, 1962, Chapter 7 "The Renewal of the Metropolis", pgs 190-191