I think they're quite mistaken on authority and the SBNR. It seems to me that St. Benedict accurately nailed the SBNR 15 centuries ago in his description of the sarabites: "Their law is what they like to do, whatever strikes their fancy. Anything they believe in and choose they call holy; anything they dislike, they consider forbidden."

The SBNR are *all about* authority--their authority--and the degree to which they get to pick and choose.

And the church does not do this???

Do what, specifically?

"pick and choose - say what is holy and what is forbidden" - does not seem much different to me.

First off, the church is a group. Whereas individuals can change their minds as they like, a group has built in accountability--especially if they write stuff down...

The Episcopal Church, in particular, has an implicit rule-of-life because we choose to invest authority within our Book of Common Prayer. That gives us three major things to work with: a liturgical structure, some low-level ascetical suggestions, and a set of base guidelines on what should shape our practice.

The first is found in the first sentence of the first real section of the prayer book on page 13: Holy Eucharist on Sundays and Holy Days, Daily Morning and Evening Prayer--daily.

The second is in our calendar section under Days of Special Devotion on page 17.

The third are the directives in our Baptismal Covenant on pages 304-5 which provide guidelines for spiritual practices: i.e., continuing in the apostles' teaching and fellowship, resisting evil, proclaiming the Good News by word and deed, Seek and serving Christ in others, striving for justice & peace, respecting the dignity of all, etc.

So--no--I think the church offers a more clear set of directives while still allowing variety based on peoples' inclination and calling. It's not just a free-for-all.

Yow! I find the tenor of this conversation really troubling! Clearly the concept of SBNR really gores someone's ox!
That said, I found the Copeland article fascinating because I've long wondered what SBNR means. What the article suggests is that it refers to people who have spiritual concerns (unlike the many who do not), but who are asking questions, not looking for fixed answers. That seems wonderful to me, and exactly what church should be about --- asking questions. That SBNR people think that churches are only about laying down harsh rules speaks to how well the fundamentalist churches are conveying their message, and how poorly we have done conveying ours. I would love to have more SBNR people in the congregations I attend.

Yes Laura - very troubling -- I think the church should be a place that follows Rilke's idea of "living the questions" and welcoming seekers.

Implicit in the idea of "seeking" is "finding."

"Seekers," IOW, are looking for something, because they are not able to find it on their own. This is the central idea behind A.A. and the other 12-Step programs; people are unable to find answers to some very, very serious problems - life-threatening problems, in fact - without help. They have, precisely, not been able to find the answers they've been seeking after.

They are, though, looking for answers, not just asking questions - and the Twelve Steps are the answers. People can ignore them, if they like - they're officially labeled "The Twelve Suggested Steps of A.A." - but A.A. folks often point out that "doing it 'my way' was what got me here in the first place."

IOW, there is an already-existing "authority" even in (what appears at first to be) a free-for-all like A.A. It's an authority that was worked out over time, empirically, on the basis of "what actually happened in lived experience" - and was codified and laid down specifically for the benefit of those who would come later.

This is a good thing! It means somebody else has already done the heavy lifting, and people who come to 12-Step Programs can just start right in on working out their own recovery, without having to start over again at square one. "Conversation" (if there's a Sacrament in 12-Step programs, it's "talking") happens in the context of what people have already learned.

Thanks Ann --- I'm relieved. Then the next question is "What kinds of barriers are we settiing up that make it difficult for those seekers to find us?"

On a related note, the phrase "Spiritual but not religious" has a much wider usage now than it did, say, 15 years ago. That's because most of the online dating sites (which most of my friends use to find dates) ask people to check a box which asks about your religious orientation. The choice is usually rather limited. Which poses the question: I'm not a Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim, or an atheist. As an Episcopalian, should I check "Christian," "Spiritual but not religious," "I'll tell you later," or just leave the question blank?

It does seem as if the Episcopal Church is more and more emphasizing the beginnings of Christian formation, but leaving things there. Seeking seems divorced from finding, and "Repent and believe the Gospel" has been exchanged for "Now don't go changing yourself for God, because God loves you just the way you are." Of course seeking is important. Of course God loves us as we are. Neither of those ideas are adequate by themselves, though. We don't seem to be doing a very good job of offering people the opportunity for life changing, transformational encounters with God. If all they were interested in was seeking, or remaining who-what they are now, why do we think theyd be interested in the Church?

Maybe they want to have a place to worship with others God whom they have found and continue to find and be found by. The questions will continue -- we don't have all the answers but pray we have Jesus Christ in our midst and that people will see and participate in that reality. Worship is the primary thing we have to offer - not answers.

Worship is the primary thing we have to offer - not answers.

Well, but the way we worship comes out of the answers the church has worked out over the course of 2,000 years.

We sing hymns with lyrics - - and not just any lyrics; the words have to convey the theology we hold to, or else the hymn won't appear in the hymnal. Likewise for the worship service as a whole; we don't just throw any old thin in there. The Prayer Book is 500 years old now, and every time it's been revamped a group of people have carefully worked through what it should be and what it should say.

We listen to 3 readings from Scripture, plus a Psalm each Sunday, in our native language; that implies that we believe that Scripture is rather important - important enough that it should be read so that listeners understand it.

We say one of the Creeds at just about every service.

We pray for ourselves, our friends, and the world; that's by way of a decision that it's important to do this. We listen to the Eucharistic Prayer every Sunday, and to what it teaches. We have Communion at almost every service now. (Morning and Evening Prayer, though, offer their own systems of worship, based on what we thought was important in our faith.)

So the worship itself contains answers: it's based on the historic faith of the church, and not just on a "spiritual but not religious" idea of God. It points, specifically, to certain ideas and not to other ones.

(Even the rubrics in the Prayer Book teach something - and the book is right out there in Public Domain, for anybody to read and investigate.

One of the benefits of having things written down - as Derek said above - is that if we are not living up to our own professed beliefs, then we can correct ourselves - or, if it comes to that, we can leave the church if we no longer agree at all with what it teaches. We can act on our own consciences.

Same goes for the church itself: if it's not living up to its beliefs, it will - rightly - get slammed. And then it will have to correct and/or reform itself.)

I definitely see where barbara and Derek are coming from. One of the barriers of fundamentalism can be having too many answers--and if you don't like any one of them, you're damned. We in TEC, on the other hand, can suffer from offering too few.

-Alex Scott

The thing is: if all we offer is values-free worship, then we'll never get anybody in the doors who isn't already interested in worship for its own sake.

And, in fact: we'll never be able to attract the SBNR, since they are, by definition, "not religious." They won't be there for worship - because why should they be? What could worship mean to them? It meant nothing to me when I was SBNR myself - so why would I spend my Sunday mornings in a church? There's no reason to be there, which is exactly why I spent 35+ years away from the church.

A "seeker's service" - if we go that route - will have to appeal to something besides worship by itself.

(In any case: I do believe that Christianity offers answers to questions.

I believe its best feature, in fact, is that it totally confounds any ideas I might come up with myself! Whenever I think I have "the answer" - I realize that I'm not even close.

Christ really does make kings (and the rest of us) "shut their mouths" and be stunned. The faith is much, much deeper than anything I've come across before - much more shocking, too. When you try to grasp ahold of it, you find you just can't. And that's a terrific answer in itself.

As far as I can see, the faith confounds everybody's personal agenda or ideas; it's just way bigger than we are. And the more I read and think about it, the more clear this seems to me.

So that's why I'm here. Even if I leave the church itself, I'll still hold to the faith; I guess you could call me RBNS at this point!)