Today, there are 4,378 people actively involved in 99 fresh expressions of church across the Leicester Diocese. In fact, more than one in four of the Anglican worshippers in the diocese attend a new form of church rather than a traditional one. And these new types of churches aren’t drawing people away from the traditional Anglican parish. They are strengthening each other.
The Hope of the Future
When I compare the Sydney and Leicester approaches it appears that one diocese has decided they don’t really need to change much about their churches — they just need to encourage greater commitment from their members — while the other diocese is willing to embrace experimentation and radical change.
One diocese only ordains male clergy; the other releases women and men to serve in a variety of forms. One diocese requires its clergy to complete rigorous theological study; the other licenses lay and lay-lay leaders. One diocese is complaining that the culture has changed; the other develops forms of church that are shaped by a particular culture or context. One diocese is declining; the other is flourishing with new life.
FINDING THE HOPE OF THE FUTURE
I’ve been writing for a long time that for the church in the West the hope of the future is to release and sustain fresh new expressions of church.
I’ve seen many such churches get started and not survive. I’ve often been criticized for fostering an unsustainable movement. But I’m beginning to think that the tide is turning. After some failed experiments by some hardy and brave souls who launched out early (God love them), we’re beginning to get this right, if Leicestershire is anything to go by.
It’s so encouraging. I’m getting more and more sure I was right when I wrote this way back in 2006:
“I, for one, am happy to see the end of Christendom. I’m glad that we can no longer rely on temporal, cultural supports to reinforce our message or the validity of our presence. I suspect that the increasing marginalization of the Christian movement in the West is the very thing that will wake us up to the marvelously exciting, dangerous, and confronting message of Jesus. If we are exiles on foreign soil—post-Christendom, postmodern, postliterate, and so on—then maybe at last it’s time to start living like exiles, as a pesky, fringe-dwelling alternative to the dominant forces of our times. As the saying goes, ‘Way out people know the way out’.” (from Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture, p.8)
This article on how new kinds of churches are the hope of the future originally appeared here, and is used by permission.
