Abi's 13th Blogiversary!

Well...here we are with another two-year skip! 👀  Even for your wee purple abbess, the past two years have been something else all together...but it seems appropriate that I would choose 2020 -- the Purple Year -- for returning to blogging. 💜 

So many things have happened in the past two years...so many things have happened in the past 13 years! I am a very different person in so many ways--it will be interesting to unpack and process some of that here.

I spent the first few years sharing the 10-year process of my deconstruction of institutional religion, from 2005-2015. There were only a few posts during the rubble-clearing years, from 2016-2018. There were no posts last year, which was the year of leveling the ground and laying the new foundation. And this is the first post in 2020, into the third quarter of what has been a wildly liminal year, even before the corona virus changed life as we knew it.

It has been 15 years since I have actually engaged in the life and ministry of a local congregation. It seems so strange to see that in writing...and that it has been such a long period of time. It is not surprising that it should take me 15 years to work my way out of 49 years of experience and expectation...it was planted so deep into my core that I didn't even realize that lots of that stuff was there!

But I did come across an interesting post from 10 years ago about the iconic iMonk that deeply resonates with where I am today. In it I ponder what I called the Perichoretic Community, which is what I've lately been calling Core of Four (Co4). I've also been pondering a Rule of Life again, and remains the amazing fundamental concept of cHesed.

I've been talking for so many years about finally getting around to processing Perichoretic cHesed. Its time may have finally come...or not. We'll just see how things roll out. But it may be closer, since I have been attending a new church plant in my community and am slowly beginning to engage there. We will see what Papa and Jesus and Sarayu have planned for me and for that community.

Stay tuned...😎

Be blessed. 

Abi

Abi and The Dones....

Update on 8/1/19:  here's the link to Josh's book Church Refugees.   And here's the link to Wayne Jacobsen's book Beyond Sundays, which is an important response to Packard's book.

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I have been following the Facebook page of Josh Packard, as well as his (link updated 8/1/19) website concerning those he calls the dechurched. Yesterday and today he linked Facebook posts to the blog of John W. Hawthorne, where I read this blog post. It is important to go and read that post...or the rest of this post will not make as much sense as it should....

What follows is the comment I left on Josh's Facebook post:

Very well said. I do believe that there are a segment of the Dones who are done with institutional Church...and this article hits many of the reasons why. When I was growing up in Michigan, we had an old record called The Game of Life, which was essentially an audio of an announcer at an imaginary football game...where Jesus was the quarterback...and all the players were personifications of character. Think Paul Bunyon does Football.... While it was hysterically funny, I don't think it was intended to be.

We have been given the personification for the church, actually three:

It is a Family -- the family of the King. Kingdom life is family life. And Lord knows there are plenty of rules that have formed around family life. Part of the struggle has been the desire to continue to laminate the rules of patriarchy onto the Family of God...and many Dones are done with playing the patriarchy game.

The second is as Bride of Christ...and there are just as many rules about what is means to be a Bride -- ones that are a subset of patriarchy.

When half the population of the world (women) are regulated to the margins to the extent that they are in so many institutionalized manifestations of the Church, many of those women -- and their families -- find themselves unable to grow and exercise the gifts the Spirit has bestowed on the for the building up of the Body of Christ, which is the third one. It is no wonder that so many women find ministry opportunities outside the church in the social services area of communities and paracurch organizations, where the rules are less stringent because the immediate needs for workers are so high. Same applies to the mission field, where women are often embraced because there is such a high need for willing hands and feet.

Then there are some of us who have had to make a stand because we have sons who can't understand why Christians don't believe in equality.... I have embarked on a long road of providing a fresh vision of Church for the sake of my sons and their future families.

Finally, I come to the Body of Christ. If people really learned their physiology and considered the beauty and intricacy of the human body, perhaps they would see that there is another set of rules altogether that apply. But some do not see the body/soul/spirit as one whole...they see the body as parts. And when the Body of Christ moves to a mechanistic, utilitarian view, then parts are parts. If one part isn't working, just cut it out and transplant a fresh one. Or give it the latest drug (What? Side effects?!) to keep it under control.

As many of us have embraced alternatives to the professional medical institutions, ones which consider the patient in a holistic manner, we have been enlightened to how the Body of Christ has not been well cared for at the cellular level...

Well, I certainly didn't intent to wax on...but this struck some big nerves. I may have to do some pondering about this over at my wee blog later. Blessings!

There are a couple of typos in there, but I'm too tired to look for them...imperfection is important. ;^)

And I'm not done pondering this post...but I didn't want too much time to pass before sharing it here, just in case it is encouraging or interesting to any of my fellow journey mates.

Be blessed!

Abi