synchroblogging- New Monasticism

Due to busyness I am quoting Paul Chambers from the Greenbelt management group;

"The new monastic life must embrace both the need for community as the essence of an authentic spiritual journey and the importance and freedom of individual interpretations of that journey. Those wishing to communicate and build relationship with a post-Christian culture need to implement this with some urgency. Only a dying minority have an interest in mediocre uniformity. Many are tired of those who would espouse theoretical knowledge, what is longed for is a sharing of a practical knowledge of how to live as an individual who is part of and co-responsible for a community. Bonhoeffer states that, ‘the community which is the subject of the Beatitudes is the community of the crucified.’ Contemporary missiology is concerned with amalgamating strands – restoring those broken and embracing those which survive. Scholars such as Lesslie Newbigin and Dietrich Bonhoeffer were some of the last voices of modernity who believed community was key to living fully. Mike Riddell and Dave Andrews are two of the first voices giving perceptive insights of how we embrace and build community from within the complexities of post-modernity. At some point we must ask the question; does anything connect across this paradigm shift? I suspect authentic and lasting renewal comes not from a Pentecost experience, but from moments immersed with the fragrance of Gethsemane and Calvary.

In other words the Enlightenment (modernity) was the old paradigm; just maybe the new monasticism (post-modernity) could be the new. A principle central to the ideas of post-modern monasteries without walls was an equally essential aspect of any historical monastic order, namely solitude. Solitude is something post-modern people crave but struggle to find. Jesus often retreated to be alone, to find privacy and nourish his soul – to that place where God mystically and tenderly exposes our weakness and nourishes and sustains us. Thomas Merton describes this mystical solitude as contemplation and I believe that this contemplation (solitude) is a helpful eschatological vision to manifest a simplicity that will assist in building an authentic community of faith. "

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It is essential that pious demands are not placed on people who are not ready to meet them. One must nurture carefully an earthed spirituality to allow a change of course and provide an open door into a new world. Throughout history story telling has been the primary means of communicating matters of significance. I think it was Walter Brueggemann who said that a metastory, if replaced by a personal story, only makes the Biblical story more poignant in connection to our journeying. Storytelling, eating and drinking around a fire – these are all participatory activities where one can learn, be vulnerable, and begin a healing at grass-roots level in the form of community.

For the coal carriers of today walking into the unknown is a risk. We have to live with contradictions, we have to help one another through the wasteland, but more than that we must continue to nurture what it means to follow Christ, and reform who we have become. The new monasticism will, as does table church, personify desire. There will be tempers and frustrations, but they are saturated in passion. As I look around the majority of churches I visit I see mostly the church is trying to create nice people, and the consequence of this is that most are bored. Was there not a promise of not thirsting any more and life in all its fullness? Too many pilgrims still leave church spiritually thirsty and malnourished. Contemporary monasticism is not about efficiency but inclusion. Douglas Coupland advocates this in his work, suggesting that they key happiness is the importance of a safe, open place to discuss and find the meaning of life, where friends and strangers can begin once more the difficult task of finding community in a fragmented world.

You can read the full article here.

Other synchrobloggers this month are:

Phil Wyman at Phil Wyman's Square No More
Beth at Until Translucent
Adam Gonnerman at Igneous Quill
Steve Hayes at Notes from the Underground
Jonathan Brink at JonathanBrink.com

Sally Coleman at Eternal Echoes
Bryan Riley at at Charis Shalom
Cobus van Wyngaard at My Contemplations
Mike Bursell at Mike's Musings
David Fisher at Cosmic Collisions
Alan Knox at The Assembling of the Church
Sam Norton at Elizaphanian
Erin Word at Decompressing Faith
Sonja Andrews at Calacirian

I leave you with this picture;