Editorial March 11, 2019 Issue

A humble and earnest response to the demand for Church

Kim Crooks Korinek

The demand for Church is real. Some might agree with that statement. Others emphatically won’t. And yet, in spite of declining membership, concerns about youth leaving church, tragic stories of abuse, and a trend toward the politicization of churches, there is something else going on.“Something new is trying to be born,” states author and Christian reformer Brian McClaren (“Denominations: Pangs of Death or Pains of Birth,” Center Aisle, July 7, 2012, https://centeraisle.blog/2012/07/07/denominations-pangs-of-death-or-pains-of-birth/).

He is commenting about the major transformation going on in Christianity today that is seeing traditional authority fall away, giving an opening to a radical reexamination and rebirth of church. Mary Baker Eddy shared the following insight over one hundred years ago in her book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures: “The time for thinkers has come. Truth, independent of doctrines and time-honored systems, knocks at the portal of humanity. Contentment with the past and the cold conventionality of materialism are crumbling away. Ignorance of God is no longer the stepping-stone to faith” (p. vii).

This “something new” is being pushed by the demand for something higher and holier and is growing to be a driving force. It is a drive that is strong, soundly rejecting hollow traditions for a more practical spirituality. And this is bringing new forms to fulfill the ideals most often associated with church, where, even now, sports groups and recovery groups are filling the need for meaning, healing, and community.

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Bible Lens—March 11–17, 2019