Grups?

I just read this article at New York Magazine about a new cultural trend: grups. (HT: marko ). Basically, these are adults (30 and 40-somethings) who are still following the same cultural trends as teenagers and 20-somethings. (music, dress, activities, etc.) This article raises at least two questions for me:

1) What role does the diminishing generational gap play in the way one ministers to one's context? Particularly a rural context. (Like mine soon to be in rural northern virginia).

2) What does this 'trend' say about what people are looking for in a community of faith? (Christian or not) What does this say about the way they live out their faith as followers of Jesus (if they are followers of Jesus)?

Granted this is just one article talking about a trend they see in New York City, but I do see some of that in the people in my current congregation and its surrounding context in suburban Richmond, VA. Not to mention I can sort of relate to this cultural trend (with the exception to paying $400 for a pair of jeans!) in terms of the music I choose, the clothes I want to wear, the freedom from "the man", etc. How do you relate? What do you think of grups?

From MizLiz: Communion Service ... all music (or mostly all music!)

Our subdistrict does a Fifth Sunday evening service whenever there's such a Sunday in a month. One of my churches is hosting the July service and we are doing an (almost) entirely musical setting for communion. The only spoken parts will be the welcome, the scriptures, and the homily. I'm outlining (below) the service and would love to hear some feedback. Bear in mind, we are simple country folks with good theology, various musical talents, and a spirit of joy for worship!
PRELUDE
ENTRANCE: "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee" [Ancient/Modern version]
BRINGING IN THE LIGHT OF CHRIST: Phos Hilaron and Joyous Light
APOSTOLIC GREETING: from the Lutheran Book of Worship
WORSHIP HYMNS: Come, Now Is The Time To Worship, He Is Exalted, Here I Am To Worship, and I Love You, Lord
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE: FWS 2201
SPECIAL CHOIR ANTHEM: to be determined
SCRIPTURE
HOMILY
CONFESSION AND PARDON: Breathe, We Bow Down
GLORIA PATRI
OFFERING/OFFERTORY: to be determined
DOXOLOGY: FWS 2008
THE GREAT THANKSGIVING: FWS 2268, 2256, 2257c, 2278
distribution of the elements: two at a time receive the elements, and then, in turn, serve the next two . . . .
COMMUNION MUSIC: to be detetermined by our stunningly gifted music director who has spot-on sensibilities for this
HYMN(S): to be determined
BENEDICTION
MUSICAL RESPONSE TO BENEDICTION: FWS 2072 "Amen, Amen"

Love to hear suggestions and feedback in the spirit of grace and joy and love and light . . .
mizliz

Speaking of legal...Here is a great article on taking pictures of people....

WIRED article on taking and posting legal pictures of the general public.

FYI,
In Trinity,
D.G.

Copyright... or copy wrongs?

DG has asked a good question in one of the comments to the previous thread. It's something that affects us all, whether we like it or not, whether we think it's fair or not. What can or can't we do with copyrighted material when we gather as church or as any part of church?

If you want to learn a LOT about this, click here.
This is a page that gathers everything we've posted on the GBOD website on this topic over the years. If it's not there, it's probably only because no one has asked it before. If you ask it now, and we've not answered it yet, we'll thank you for your question and add more!

The bottom line on DG's question is that if you are gathering as church or any kind of church group (whether you call that a network or whatever), then, yes, you must have whatever licensing is appropriate to use whatever copyrighted material you need to use. If I understand DG's situation, his appointment is to an existing church and his ministry is offered through that church, though the effect of it may be to start a new church. As long as he is operating under the auspices of an existing church, if THAT church has the appropriate licenses, AND if the usages proposed are properly covered by those licenses, then those usages are covered. If that church does NOT have such licenses, it must get them if DG wants to use any copyrighted materials. The current CVLI ONLY applies to movies and videos from a limited set of studios, and then ONLY for showings in the particular buildings of the church in question. So showing movies anywhere but church property, or recording things on the DVR, much less editing them, isn't covered at all by any license at this time... which means you'd need to get copyright permission from the copyright holder for each and every showing at each and every location, and probably pay a good sized royalty to get it.

Now, whether every node of a network would have to get its own license... that depends on how the nodes relate to the whole entity AND on the particular terms of EACH licensing agreement. If each node is really entirely independent from a legal perspective, then, yes, each has to get its own license, pursuant to the requirements of the licensing agreements. If each is part of a larger whole, then the larger whole to which it relates has to get its own license which it may, in some limited instances, share across its ministries-- but again, this is limited by the requirements of the license itself. Some licenses may not allow this. You have to read each one, and if it's not clear, call the license provider and ask them the question. For example, though an Annual Conference may have a CCLI license, and Districts are legally subentities of an Annual Conference, a Conference CCLI license can ONLY be used by the Conference itself for Conference activities-- it cannot allow any other entity to use it without violating the terms of the licensing agreement and so being subject to a civil lawsuit for damages. Likewise, a District CCLI cannot cover any activities for local congregations within the district. Nor can a congregation "share" it's CCLI with any other congregation.

During the past year or so, a lot of movies whether on DVD or in the theaters, have been preceded by a trailer that says, "Piracy... is stealing.... Stealing... is a crime."

And for us, stealing is more than a crime... it's a breach of our covenant with God-- the very God we're trying to represent and help people connect with in all of our ministries as church... emerging or otherwise.


Peace in Christ,

Taylor Burton-Edwards

IT'S ALREADY BEEN SUNG, BUT...

it can't be said enough....

- eddie vedder, pearl jam

MY REFLECTION:
I posted this song today on my blog because as I was listening to this last night it occured to me that "Love Boat Captain" can become a great metaphor for God in this song. If you listen to this song as a dialog between Vedder to God and Vedder to society then it becomes a great worship song. I'm keeping it in the back of my mind as a possible alt.worship song at some point in the near future. Shalom. JN.

Emergent Women's Regathering... from Miz Liz (though posted by a fairly white male in his early 40s....)

An intrepid group of emergent women and women curious about emergent and emerging church gathered the last weekend in April in a little town just outside of Indianapolis at a B&B inside an old round barn, cleverly enough called The Round Barn Bed and Breakfast Inn.

We came together to hear women's voices be spoken and heard. We came to find a community, to create a community really, where the glorious words and values of emergent: inclusive, equal, diverse - would be lifted up in such a way that we felt full partnership and participation. That we had to do it on our own beyond the organization of emergentvillage was sad and noticed. We came to discover a path into the 21 century and the 21century church that allowed for our authentic and genuine encounter and expression of God in us and through us. We came to dare to vision such a community might exist this side of 'the world to come'. We came to share, to cry, to laugh, to celebrate chocolate, to celebrate one another, and to be blessed together as the precious daughters of God, no more and no less claimed and named as our brothers and friends.

We spent some time lamenting that emergent as a group of leaders seemed to be predominantly white, male, between 30-50 years old, of a comfortable economic status and education, and peculiarly connected to one another. Some of us who had tried to engage those men who are frequently pictured in slick brochures announcing conventions and workshops shared as to how we felt something less than affirmed, included, welcomed, and befriended. Some felt that for all the pretty words emergent was pretty much like our denominations or home churches were women's voices and leadership, while perhaps proclaimed as equal and valued, recognized too deeply the great fixed gap between what is and what would be professed. This coming the week before we UM celebrated the 50th anniversary of the full ordination of women clergy made it all the more poignant and sad for me personally.

We did celebrate within ourselves the stunning gift of being called of God to all kinds of ministry in many different kinds of settings. For those participants who came from traditions where women are barred from all word and sacrament ministry, hearing and seeing my seminary friend and me preaching and celebrating communion was, by their account, a "defining moment in my journey". Thanks be to God! I am confident that those of us gathered were blessed and, in turn, blessed one another with the community of gifted and graced and called women that we became.

Emergent seems to have a lot of work to do between the rhetoric and the reality. In terms of confession, our gathering was completely caucasian, although the age, economics, education, and ecclesiastical diversity was good. I don't know what the answer is to this problem. We wondered among ourselves if somehow the glorious possibilities of emergent that we see is not relevant to the context of those from minority or ethnic backgrounds. I was preparing to exit the emergent conversation as hopelessly hypocritical but when I hear the women from those traditions without example or path into genuine leadership within the body of Christ, I know emergent has given them a vocabulary and light that I wouldn't dream of taking away, or not celebrating. So, I don't know how we proceed as the dyfunctional family of emergent. We have to be willing to talk and to listen and not be dismissive or patronizing or defensive.

I am anxious and hopeful to hear from y'all. Grace and peace.

mizliz

Emergent Cohort

I just got back from attending the Nashville Emergent Cohort... a local gathering of folks who are leading or exploring emerging forms of church and are committed to meeting monthly to talk about it...

The group today had at least 3 of the folks on this blog there... myself, Jonathan, and Gavin. I'd met Jonathan previously briefly. It was great to meet Gavin face to face. He may be helping us out here a bit with design issues, and we're talking about possibilities for a broader "methomergent" kind of site. There were maybe 12 or so of us there today-- including a "recovering" Willow Creek staffer, a guy who's ended up having a Bible study meeting gathering in his home, another guy who is a poet/writer and erstwhile home church pastor (with 15 people 7 of whom are children under the age of 13), a youth/young adult pastor at a local Episcopal Church, a volunteer from that ministry, and another guy who was interested in the overall topic. In all about 4 of us were newcomers to the group today. We also had a special guest from Kiev, Ukraine-- a guy named Paul Thorson who's planting a church there, and who has just published a book called Painting in the Dark -- all of us there today got free copies. And yes, it was all guys today... I think this is a real challenge point for the whole emerging thing, to what degree it really represents male only leadership, even if it is not intentional, but that's another story.

Today's topic-- worship...

The conversation was rather free-form, and I think everyone contributed along the way. I think we came to a few common affirmations, though I don't think that was the point of what we were doing...
a) Worship is fundamentally corporate... worship itself is an act of a communal body.
b) Christian worship is primarily responsive more than generative... that is, in our worship we respond to what God has done for us and through us more than we try to "gin up" something we offer to get God's attention or even to offer a pleasing sacrifice to God.
c) Christian worship is relational-- God isn't the object, but the subject (the Thou, in Buber's terms, not the It) of our action, and we are certainly not the object either. Not even of God. We're all in this together.
d) God may not need for there to be a presider-- someone whose role is to help "conduct" the giftedness of the people in an orderly and profound way-- but we probably do.

We were of several minds on talking about whether worship and prayer are the same thing... my own tilt is that they're not... that prayerfulness or attentiveness to the presence of God in all things is something we may well strive to do individually at all times, but that's not the same thing, per se, as worship.

We were also struggling with the notion of strengths and weakness. Paul Thorson reminded us that God really makes a huge difference in our lives in the places of our deepest weakness... so we maybe need to be more thoughtful about whether we look at worship only as a means of offering our best to God, and need to make room for the possibility that God is also waiting for us to cry out in our distress, failure and weakness... no happy clappy all the time, no pep-talk self-help feel-good stuff as dominant mode, etc.

All of this leads me to wonder... do any of y'all have anything like an emerging cohort where you are? If so, what's that like? What are you learning? Who's there? Who isn't there? If not, is it something you'd like to see where you are? And if you would, how might we help?

Peace in Christ,

Taylor Burton-Edwards