Author
Acres of Oak:
A Pastor Rethinks Church in the 21st Century
Acres of Oak is shorthand for the empty pews so common to church sanctuaries these days—and what it will take to make them less ubiquitous.
From ghosts to palace intrigue, from maternity wards to graveyards, from ideas that have used me to ideas I wish I had used, from acres of oak to Acres of Oak there’s something for—if not about—most everyone in my memoir.
About the Author…
Nearly fifty years ago, as a newly-minted minister with a wife beside me and our first child on the way, I met the first of what would become a nearly constant part of our lives for the ensuing decades … my parishioners. I cannot say who was the more astounded, they or me, but the journey that began in the Nebraska Panhandle would continue in churches in California and the Upper Midwest, including an unexpected detour to Maui, and now continues a half-century later in our retirement on the California coast. No small accomplishment, navigating the sometimes perilous, always challenging, and ever so significant waters of pastoral ministry, but wherever our personal journeys lead, navigating life presents for all of us any number of inevitable turning points, their signposts sometimes clearly marked … sometimes not so much. Over the years, I have reflected on scores of such markers, signposts alerting us to changes in both the cultural landscape ahead and our own personal circumstances and how we might find a path forward. Rethinking the grand drama of life itself and how faith and even the church might still intersect the earthly sojourn … the project of a lifetime.
Turning Points: Signposts and Markers for People of Faith Along the Way
Insights From: Acres of Oak
Among the imponderables that warrant a great deal of my attention are what I call the Big Three, key, critical questions the mainline churches must have the courage, wisdom, and language to tackle if they have any hope of addressing the occupants of the 21st century. They are:
- The nature of God, by which I mean not whether God exists but why God matters even if God does exist and whether we’re all functional atheists in the end anyway;
- The problem of suffering and evil, or why are there earthquakes and what does it mean when bad things happen to good people;
- The challenge of pluralism, or whether it matters what we believe so long as we believe something (unless, as some say, humankind would be better off believing nothing and thereby solving the challenge, if not some unintended consequences, of pluralism).
Here’s the thing the most provocative chapter in my memoir asks, if the missiles go up, they will come down, and whose fault will it be?
One of my favorite themes in the memoir is wrestling with Jesus’ own question, Who do you say that I am?—the picture is at once as fascinating in its scope as it is uncomfortable in its implications.
In the last half century, unprecedented levels of change have transformed the American social and cultural landscape, leaving a deep and lasting imprint on all manner of its institutions. This includes organized religion, perhaps none more than the churches of mainstream Protestantism. Standing firmly within both the social and religious center of cities and towns in the middle decades of the last century, today these churches find themselves increasingly marginalized in a culture largely indifferent to its mission and unmoved by its language. To some extent, the same might be said of large swaths of its own members. My book is a memoir reflecting fifty years of pastoral ministry navigating a pathway for just such a church.
What accounts for this tectonic shift in the religious life of the nation? Historically, these churches are theologically moderate to liberal and have enjoyed a comfortable relationship with modernity for more than a century. Most see no conflict between science and religion and neither an increase in secularism nor the emerging relativism of a post-modern world pose a necessary threat to their spiritual integrity. Such churches would seemly be well positioned to address the traditional existential and ethical concerns humankind routinely asks of religion.
When it comes to addressing those concerns, however, the traditional language of much of Christendom, embodied in but not limited to its historic creeds and doctrines, does not connect with how many people experience and make sense of the world around them. This includes people in and out of the church. Further, its language inadequate, the mission and purpose of the church lacks clarity. At issue is not just what the church believes, its faith, but what its own people are to do, their faithfulness, as a result. Little wonder we see its marginalization under such circumstances.
Current Interests
Since moving to the Central Coast of California more than a decade ago, I have been a member of the Board of Directors of People of Faith for Justice.
PFJ is an interfaith voice for social justice on the Central Coast.
In the last year, our group has begun to advocate for the global movement called Ecological Civilization (EcoCiv). EcoCiv recognizes the interrelationships that connect all levels of creation with each other and takes seriously such concerns as sustainability and limitations as pertains to both natural and social systems.
