A month ago we said good-bye to 2009. This past week I said good-bye to another year in my life journey. On such occasions many of us are motivated to ask questions about what happened in the past year. We read lists of top 10 events, name the person of the year, and hold annual meetings to put the past year to rest and make plans for the next. It is not a bad way to organize and reorganize life.

As I pondered the events of the past year, I reviewed the 52 columns I pumped out with perfect regularity. What was the most important thing about which I wrote? I did not have to ponder very long. It is the changing face of religion, and Christianity in particular, in America.

The columns that drew the most significant and thoughtful responses were those I wrote about emergent churches and the phenomenon of the emergent believer. What I reported was not speculation. The mobility of personal and collective religious thinking and practice can be verified with numbers that come out of responsible research and poling. Religion and religious practices are not going away. Total numerical growth is a fact. The greatest change is that people feel free to move their thinking outside of the boxes of tradition. No religious denomination or group is escaping the phenomenon. It is becoming difficult to find a believer who embraces the details learned in catechism classes. It is difficult even to find ministers who believe every word of historic creeds and confessions of faith. Literal interpretations of the Bible are losing ground in the most conservative of churches. Mainline churches are losing membership. Ex-Catholics abound. So also ex-Mormons. Mega-churches have grown dramatically, but they appear to have reached a plateau and are losing members about as fast as they are recruiting.

At the same time, the religious interest of younger people is booming. Colleges and universities are adding religion classes and students are filling them up as fast as they are created. Enrollment at Bible colleges is up. Private colleges that have historically specialized in values-oriented education have full enrollments and waiting lists. Enrollment numbers at theological seminaries is up significantly. A growing number of the students in theological seminaries have no intention to become ministers. They are there to search out the meanings of life.

Religion is now the most popular theme studied by historians. This was recently reported by the American Historical Association. This scholarly interest has increased five-fold in the past 10 years.

The big winner numerically is the growing phenomenon of the house church. The number of people who now attend house churches is difficult to assess. There is no church headquarters or a phone listed on a website. House churches are typically led by a lay person or possibly have no formal hierarchy of leadership. Researchers now say a minimum of 5 percent of the American population regularly attends a house church meeting that includes an element of worship. Speculation is that the number may be as high as 10 percent. If we translate the percentage into hard numbers, that means that a minimum of 15 million Americans regularly attend a house church, and the number may be as high as 30 million.

My first impulse is to ask the obvious question. Why is this happening? I suspect the answer is very complex. Some are speculating that in real life, secular theories and practices simply do not meet the needs of heart and soul (however one might define those terms). For now, I am choosing to avoid the why question. Rather I ask, “What are we to do with the social and religious phenomenon that is taking place.”

I am suggesting that we start by looking at the popularity of the house church. I maintain that human beings are social by nature. Further, I maintain that the practice of vital religion is communal. My third tenet is that in a modern world with increasing levels of education, the practice of religion must have an element of the reasonable and rational. The house church meets these needs. In a house church everyone knows everyone else. In a house church, religion can be practiced in community. Singing, reading, praying and a symbolic communal meal can take place in a house church and everyone is a full participant. The house church is almost the perfect setting for thoughtful discussion and even debate.

My thinking is also informed by the Jesus example. Why was Jesus the person that he was? Why did he become the greatest story teller of human history? How did he form understandings of life that are still vital in 2010? Some would say he was special because of a virgin birth and a unique anointing of Jehovah God. Without denying the theological specialness of Jesus as unique Son of God, I ask that we look at his growing up. He grew up in a small village that was full of poverty and hardship. In the community life of Nazareth, the most important meetings that took place were the synagogue meetings. Synagogue was not a place, but the gathering of the community. The most important purpose of the synagogue meeting was the reading of Torah, the law of God. Psalms were probably read or chanted, and prayers were said. But the heart of the gathering was the discussion/argument of the meaning of Torah to those who lived in Nazareth. Starting as a child, Jesus participated in those discussions.

Jews have a name for those discussions….Midrash. Midrash is the truth of Torah that is unstated. I suspect that there is a growing number of people who, for whatever reason, want to enter into Midrash discussions.

What happens to us all is vitally related to the groups we form and the discussions that we foster.

       

The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister who lives in Palmer. His e-mail address is hdbss@mtaonline.net.