The Future of the Mainline

This week, I’m at Columbia Theological Seminary (PC(USA)), at a continuing education event called, Emergence NOW.  Yesterday, Phyllis Tickle gave an updated version of her Great Emergence talk.  And I presented a funny little talk, 10 Myths about Emergence.  Today, Philip Clayton is speaking (as I type) about how emergence is, in his words, “God’s way of creation.”  And later this morning, Bruce Reyes-Chow will address the future of denominationalism.

It’s that last question, and the future of the mainline church in general, that gets asked a lot in gatherings like this.  I’ve got some thoughts on this, as some readers will know.  And I’m cooking up a couple more posts on this, but in the meantime I want to point you to a couple interesting resources.

First, Chad Holtz and Jeff Straka have been having an interesting conversation along these lines on an earlier post of mine.  Jeff takes the same position that I will, and Chad is a worthy adversary.

Second, check out the new and ongoing series on the future of the mainline being curated at Faith & Leadership, featuring posts so far by Brian McLaren and others.  My posts will be a response to some of these.

Finally, if you’re so inclined to follow the tweets coming out of Emergence NOW, here’s the feed:

#enow