A new Feature: Weekly Roundup
Articles from the Gospel Plow and others that have caught my attention
Friends,
As we seek to make sense of a world that seems to be both growing in complexity and increasing in instability, I thought it would be helpful to share with you some articles that are helping me to make sense of what I’m seeing. These will range across several disciplines and sources. I hope you find them useful.
I will always begin with the latest post or posts from The Gospel Plow, which I will include in this digest form in order to keep from flooding your inboxes.
God bless,
Jody
From Nostalgia to Deep Change: Adaptive Leadership for The Church
When congregations feel the ground shifting beneath them, the first impulse is often to look backward. We reach for what once worked. But this is often filtered and comes to us as a selective memory rather than a truthful narration of past experiences. Nostalgia—though…
you can read part one of this essay here:
An aside about the Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee
A recent assignment for one of my Doctor of Ministry classes involved writing a brief description of our ministry context. Since I serve the diocese and not a single congregation, the description is a little more involved.
Part of the background I shared was a brief reference to the three “Grand Divisions” of Tennessee (East, Middle, and West) as identified in the Tennessee Constitution. Reflecting on the multilplication of dioceses, first in 1982 with the formation of the Diocese of West Tennessee, and then a few year’s later in 1986 with the formation of the Diocese of East Tennessee, it occured to me it would be interesting to compare the Convocations of the single Diocese of Tennessee with the map of the current diocesan boundaries. Using a geojson file I created to show the shape of the dioceses and location of congregations, I was able to map a semi-transparent layer over this old map of the Diocese. I think the outcome is pretty interesting.
From other publications
A selection of articles from news outlets, opinion journals, magazines etc. that I read regularly.
A troubling reflection from The Atlantic: Canada is Killing itself
”When Canada’s Parliament in 2016 legalized the practice of euthanasia—Medical Assistance in Dying, or MAID, as it’s formally called—it launched an open-ended medical experiment. One day, administering a lethal injection to a patient was against the law; the next, it was as legitimate as a tonsillectomy, but often with less of a wait. MAID now accounts for about one in 20 deaths in Canada—more than Alzheimer’s and diabetes combined—surpassing countries where assisted dying has been legal for far longer.
It is too soon to call euthanasia a lifestyle option in Canada, but from the outset it has proved a case study in momentum. MAID began as a practice limited to gravely ill patients who were already at the end of life. The law was then expanded to include people who were suffering from serious medical conditions but not facing imminent death. In two years, MAID will be made available to those suffering only from mental illness. Parliament has also recommended granting access to minors.”
David Zahl offers a good word in Plough, “Against Self Optimization:”
There is a meme that makes the rounds every new school year among parents of elementary-school-aged children. I’m pretty sure it originates from the initial Covid lockdown, but the punchline still lands. A middle-aged man stands in a crowd with hands on hips, his facial expression the epitome of Not Amused. Above the picture someone has produced a message from a teacher. “Just log into Zabelzoot, scroll down to the Zork! App, and have the kids work through the assignments sent through Kracklezam.”
The meme’s staying power lies not so much in its spot-on lampooning of the make-learning-fun website names but in the exasperation of parents at the convoluted processes through which they’re expected to guide kids these days. In theory, “Zabelzoot” or its real-life equivalent is supposed to make communication between teachers and students easier. Rather than print out an assignment and hand it to your teacher, you just click to turn it in. And yet I spend as much time troubleshooting the various homework programs on my sons’ computers, updating the software, and filling out endless two-factor authentications as I do helping them with their homework. It is a crazy-making experience that leaves everyone frustrated, tired, and not remotely in the mood for learning.
Faith and Leadership: Networking: A feature of thriving communities
Our attempts to relate to other churches are often haphazard. Except for an occasional “pulpit exchange” or the joining of hands for a local good cause, many churches leave it up to the individual members to work out when and how people engage with another community of Christians.
It therefore can be quite surprising to discover that the early church was strategic. As the book of Acts shows in detail, the early Christians believed that it was necessary to create a tightly interlocking web of communities. The earliest missionaries would doubtless have taken all comers, but they focused on establishing communities in major urban centers such as Ephesus, Corinth and Rome or in cities that were geographically well-positioned for travel and trade (for example, Thessalonica, Philippi, Antioch). Establishing house churches in these locations allowed easy communication and movement between the various communities.
Because of the speed and ease of our own communication, we often pass much too quickly by the remarkable fact that the churches in Acts were in regular communication with one another.