"What if..." on "participatory formation"

(note--a work in progress, inspired by "Seizing The Episcopal Moment")

Beginning a conversation…”what if?”


What if—we took seriously God’s invitation to live a different way of “being church” in the Episcopal tribe of Oregon?

What if we truly began to act and not simply reacted to factors like waning energy in present models of church, plummeting revenues, and abundant signs that the style of church that worked in the mid-20th century is no longer adequate?

What if we took seriously Brian McLaren’s invitation and charge to “create a zone of innovation and empowerment, a zone in which creative young/emerging leaders…can be supported to plant new faith communities relevant to the needs of young adults while being exempted from conventional internal politics and institutional constraints”?

What if we largely ceased “protecting the church” from pioneers, visionaries, and dreamers, and began actively seeking, welcoming, and supporting such people in an intentional companionship relationship?

What if we shifted the locus for such a relationship BACK to the local church, the local congregations, the local context for actual ministry as opposed to a distant graduate school setting?

What if such a setting emphasize group discernment and group participation in building a theological project together, rather than a curriculum pre-set and handed down in order to “form”?

What if we gathered the rich resources of teaching and preaching and pastoral ministry we already possess in our midst in order to enrich such a setting?

What if St. David’s were preserved all this time because it is meant to be the locus for such a community?

What if this “community of ministry” were taken seriously by the diocesan COM, and not seen as a secondary substitute for “real formation” in a Div school?

What if the new bishop enthusiastically supported such a project?

What if this new community were genuinely bi-cultural such that people tropic towards OR raised up by Hispanic community settings would feel wholly welcome?

What if, within this community, those participating would find ample support and resources to discern their call to committed baptismal ministry, to diaconate, to priesthood, or to any number of emerging forms of ministerial leadership?

What if those who would welcome such a community would be actively engaged in its ongoing formation and not have something “planned for them”?

What if this community, although enriched and shaped in large part by its Anglican “tribal roots”, were significantly post-denominational?

What if this new community of mission and ministry actively equipped folks to plant and nurture new forms of community and church?

What if the community itself were a “living laboratory” of such new forms of church?

What if we actively invited and recruited people into this community?

What if this community did theology and pastoral preparation BETTER than existing Div schools?

What if people immersed in such a community could be told that the Episcopal Diocese will take their sense of call seriously and will ordain them and support them in “doing new things”?

What if this process were not seen as strictly a “youth experiment” but would be open and inviting to all ages?

What if this process were explicitly hospitable to people with families, such that participating did not mean being torn from one’s family and that creative ways to welcome kids and spouses/companions were built in?

The one non “What-if?” in this sequence is myself—I care a lot about this, and it may be that I am still here around the premises because I am called to make this an other projects take flesh. We will see. But this is much bigger than me or any one person, and I feel called to help this new community take shape.


Kurt Neilson+
August 15, 2009