William Murchison’s “Mortal Follies: Episcopalians and the Crisis of Mainline Christianity” (Encounter Books).
William Murchison’s “Mortal Follies: Episcopalians and the Crisis of Mainline Christianity” (Encounter Books).
Eh, I’ll pass.
The publishers blurb:
[blockquote] It’s not that the dignified and rarefied old Episcopal
Church quit believing in God. It’s that the God you
increasingly hear spoken of in Episcopal circles is infinitely
tolerant and given to sudden changes of mind—not quite
the divinity you thought you were reading about in the
scriptures.
Episcopalians of the twenty-first century, like their
counterparts in other churches of the so-called American
mainline—such as Methodists and Presbyterians—seem to
prefer a God that the culture would be proud of, as against
a culture that God would be proud of. While they work to
rebrand and reshelve orthodox Christianity for the modern
market, exponents of the new thinking are busy reducing
mainstream Christian witness to a shadow of its former self.
[i] Mortal Follies [/i] is the story of the Episcopal Church’s mad
dash to catch up with a secular culture fond of self-expression
and blissfully relaxed as to norms and truths. An Episcopal
layman, William Murchison details how leaders of
his church, starting in the late 1960s, looked over the culture
of liberation, liked what they saw, and went skipping
along with the shifting cultural mood—especially when the
culture demanded that the church account for its sins of
“heterosexism†and “racism.†Episcopalians have blended
so deeply into the cultural woodwork that it’s hard sometimes
to remember that it all began as a divine calling to
the normative and the eternal. [/blockquote]
From: http://www.encounterbooks.com/catalog/CatalogueFall2008.pdf
They’re generalizing lavishly, wouldn’t you say, MargaretG? Guess it sells books to the undiscerning. The publisher’s blurb doesn’t remotely describe my view of the world or any fellow Episcopalian’s that I know. Sometimes I think this tragic rift is largely sustained by horror stories about individual eccentricities, rather than vast falling away by those of us in the pews.
RE: “They’re generalizing lavishly, wouldn’t you say, MargaretG?”
Depends on who you’re talking about. The rot in the Episcopal Church begins at the top and if the author is talking about 1) the vast vast vast majority of the HOD, 2) the vast vast majority of 815, 3) the PB, 4) the vast vast majority of the 40 something members of the Executive Council, and 5) merely the vast majority of the HOB . . . then nope, the author is not generalizing at all.
If the author were writing about the vast majority of the people in the pews [mind you, not California or the Northeast] then yes, the author is generalizing lavishly.
One of the interesting marks of the modern-day TEC is that folks like the Integrity crew — representing a teensy amount of people in the pews — are in the majority in the leadership venues at the national level.
Ultimately, an organization like that won’t survive. You can’t have people leading a ship with whom the vast majority of the people in the pews basically don’t agree. The leaders have — in the past — been able to count on the people in the pews 1) not recognizing what was happening because they’re essentially congregationalists and also unconnected, and 2) nobody publicly resisting.
Those two things are changing.
And because the leaders are — of course — persisting in the direction they intend for TEC, the ship is breaking apart.
Not that this is a particular concern of the progressive activists in leadership or power — but it will happen, and we are watching it happen before our eyes.
At least, as Episcopalians, we live in utterly fascinating and enthralling times as we watch a mainline denomination break apart, slowly, but loudly and publicly.
Who is this guy, and why does what he says matter? Why him and not Philip Jenkins, Diana Butler Bass, Loren Mead, or Mike Regele?
The Episcopal church is not “breaking apart” but it is melting down financially and numerically, like other mainline denominations. This has more to do with the expectations of parishioners to have personal chaplains than leaders with expectations of ministry.
And a musical and liturgical fundamentalism.
the vast majority of the people in the pews [mind you, not California or the Northeast]
Even more than 20 years ago, when I left, lots of people I knew in the Diocese of Dallas (flyover country) who would have agreed with the leadership of TEC. I knew many more who might have disagreed, but would never be gauche enough to discuss it. You might as well use the dinner fork for your salad.
Twenty percent of the diocese of Fort Worth is remaining with TEC. Significant conservative, as well as liberal voices, stayed in San Joaquin and Pittsburgh, and, I believe, in Quincy. Don’t underestimate the degree of theological rot, Sarah, and, more than that, theological indifference.
#4 And who gave DBB and others their start? Why are they now authorities? And would they be if they had never received that first publication?
BTW liturgical and musical fundamentalism? Say what?!!! We’ve had more liturgical experimentation in the last 20 years than in the previous 500 or so (if you go back to the Reformation)! I don’t know which church you are attending, but there is a tremendous amount of flexibility out there. Of course, this may just be a symptom of the Burger King and Sinatra Church (everything my way)!
Seems the Orthodox do have liturgical and musical fundamentalism, but they ain’t a dying like us.
RE: “Who is this guy, and why does what he says matter?”
What he says does not matter at all to folks with JW’s gospel and worldview.
RE: “The Episcopal church is not “breaking apart†but it is melting down financially and numerically, like other mainline denominations.”
Not exactly. The Episcopal Church is melting down [i]not at all[/i] in the same way as other mainline denomination. The acceleration and intensity of the decline is far far greater than even the PCUSA church.
RE: “This has more to do with the expectations of parishioners to have personal chaplains than leaders with expectations of ministry.”
Well, no.
It has to do — clearly from the numbers — with the church radically veering off the rails at GC 2003.
How do we know this? Because the rate of decline doubled — that’s right, [i]doubled[/i] — post GC 2003.
Prior to GC 2003, the church was just in a good steady decline similar to the other mainlines — which decline in itself was because conservatives recognized that the leadership of those mainlines no longer believed or proclaimed the Gospel. But after GC 2003, the brakes came off the locomotive, and the engine picked up speed, hurtling down the mountain.
It is intriguing to see the contortions that progressive activists go through to try to deny the clear consequences of their theology on TEC.
It’s almost as if they’re not willing to just say “aw, heck — sure we’re going to lose the bigots and fundamentalists with our decisions and open publicity about our theology. So yeh — we’re going into steep decline. But who cares?”
Instead — they engage in frankly delusory assertions and rhetorical acrobatics, all to try to avoid acknowledging the state of the emperor.
Were I a liberal, I’d just go ahead and admit it, and shrug my shoulders. It’d be too embarrassing for me to try to deny the obvious in front of the world.
[i] The publisher’s blurb doesn’t remotely describe my view of the world or any fellow Episcopalian’s that I know [/i] —NoVa Scout
The publisher’s blurb is less a “description” than a thematic characterization.
To take a secular example, people don’t describe themselves as “desperate to keep up with the latest fads.” They say, “I want a car that’s fun to be in,” “I want clothing that helps me feel confident when I meet new people,” or “I want a Blackberry that lets me __________.” Yet tens of thousands of people really are so eager to keep up with the latest fads that they strain their budgets and suffer needless anxiety. Calling them “desperate to keep up with the latest fads,” although hyperbolic, makes a fair point about them.
At a similar level of thematic characterization, it’s fair so say that ECUSA’s leaders have for decades identified less with orthodox Christianity than with elite secular culture: a culture of moral relativism; a culture that views traditional Christianity as a baleful force in human history; a culture that regards evangelism as a form of political and cultural imperialism. Those leaders take their agenda not from scripture but from the world.
Since the 1980s, moreover, ECUSA’s leaders have embraced an increasingly intolerant political correctness. If their agenda causes the church to wither, then so be it: their secular agenda is paramount.