"Moving with God - Transforming Communities"

The title of this post is the 'vision statement' of the Uniting Church in Australia Synod of NSW/ACT. It represents a distilling of a range of workshops held across NSW/ACT as the 'Moderator' [our elected full time leader] listened in the hope of being able to articulate OUR vision of the church as we hoped it would be...

The workshops were OK with predictable descriptions of the post modern era and the areas the church could be engaged in the mission of God in the world. Then the Councils of the church discussed and reflected and gave feedback on a version of the vision shaped very clearly [read massaged, changed, directed] by our current missional directions BUT it was eventually agreed upon as a direction we could embrace...

To my mind it lacked a feedback loop to the original sources to check if they had been heard correctly [the discussions at various councils didn't really canvass that] and while I think the overall catch phrase has lots going for it... where's the theological work, the practical workings and resources focused on our congregations as our primary mission units?

At least the Synod meeting understood that it's not an imperialistic sense of 'transforming communities' or in other words the transformation might well be in the church, the community around it or both.

Moving with God - Transforming Communities works... It should probably be followed my a maximum 5-6 dot points which point to practical focus... courageous inclusive and generous sound good and have provided a framework for the last [3] synod meetings so that our current Moderator has been able to add a layer of reflection and some quite radical ideas to the mix.

I suppose what I reckon might be the next step is a discussion guide for a four session conversation in congregations, faith communities, agencies and amongst leaders and committees about how they see this vision and how they plan to 'get onboard' in real ways...

Moving with God would address contemporary theology... not as an argument between 'progressives' and 'traditionals' but allowing people to reflect on how their faith and scripture give meaning to their lives, using scripture authoritatively, not to hit people over the head but as a mirror asking ourselves how we live it out.

We need to embrace our origin as a 'movement' not a denomination so the discussion should include reflection on key 'Basis of Union' statements.

What's our answer to the question... what difference does God actually make?

What story are we telling? a question which ought to move us to the margins

We ought to plan to practice the radical inclusion of the Spirit of God... feed, clothe, set free...

Rediscover the foolishness of the cross and the bits of God's story which can't be explained

Finding a new definition for spirituality

And while there's already some crossover, transforming communities:

Worship connecting life and faith

Missio Dei

Create transformative spaces and experiences

Give space, permission and validity to new things

Live out faith practices

Adopt an emergent manifesto

Live out our ethics

Be open to be changed by the renewing of our minds from our incarnational relationships with those around us

We need some simple resources for ideas of how to 'be connected in our community' and I've blogged before about missional youth ministry ideas... losing ourselves in serving others!!