Book REview God and the Machine: Navigating Faith in the Age of AI

 

God and the Machine:Navigating Faith in the Age of AI By Nathan Webb ©2026 Abingdon Press

From the bio on the Abingdon Press page for this book: “Nathan Webb is an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church and the founding pastor of Checkpoint Church, a digital-first United Methodist community”. In this book he takes on questions around the use of AI in the church.

Webb encourages us to look at these questions through the lens of the Great Commandment, which makes sense given that some would insist that all parts of the Christian life need to be viewed through that lens. He also holds the view that the choice to not discuss the role of AI in our life as a church is not tenable. AI is now a part of the world, and increasingly so (the growth since 2020 is astounding) and while the church, or at least parts of the church, have traditionally been slow to adopt new technology we risk being left behind if we do not engage. At the same time we have to admit that every new technology has two edges so what are the two edges that AI brings? He continually reminds us that just because we CAN do something does not necessarily mean that we should.

Webb starts with defining technology in general and AI specifically. He posits that as a tool we need to ask things like: who created/builds this, who uses it, who controls it, who benefits from it, and who does it serve. These are good questions for a variety of tech tools as we work out the best/most ethical way forward. Among the notes I took I jotted down the idea that if we are not intentional about our discernment we might not keep the ability to control how AI becomes a part of our lives. He also notes that because AI chatbots seem so human-like people have had a tendency to anthropomorphize AI. We need to resist and speak against that temptation. This is a theme he carries forward throughout the book – AI is not human, does not have human feelings, can not replace human caring and love.

In Chapter 3 Webb takes on the question of “Does God Use Technology?”. Maybe God, through human creativity is giving us the tech tools for us to use as part of how we serve God. In this case we need to discern how best to use those tools. This leads into Chapter 4 which looks at ethics around the use of AI.

Later in the book Webb raises the question of ecclesiology. In that chapter he discusses how Checkpoint Church operates and what the ecclesiology of that congregation is. He makes the very valid point that most of our congregations need to be more intentional about our ecclesiological assumptions.

The final chapter talks about what Webb refers to as “human forward thinking”. Here he talks about embodiment. He starts with talking about whether online interactions can be thought of as being embodies. HE said this is one of the criticisms he has frequently met when people ask if an online church can truly be seen as a church. It reminded me of a time 20 years ago when people wondered if digital community could truly be called community, or the early resistance to online dating. Later in the chapter he returns to the idea that AI is not embodied.

This was a good book. There is also a study guide available so it might be a good discussion group resource. Webb pushes us to consider how to move forward into a world where AI is a reality. He reminds us that AI should be seen as providing augmentation rather than replacement. As Christians we need to use whatever tools we us to build love and justice, as leaders we have to model healthy and ethical practices what ever we do. This is true whatever choices we make about AI.

Book Review: From Social Media to Social Ministry: A Guide to Digital Discipleship

 

From Social Media to Social Ministry: A Guide to DigitalDiscipleship By Nona Jones ©2020 Zondervan Press 176 pages.

When it comes to being a hybrid church or finding new ways to be church in an online world we have to move beyond Sunday morning. Much of the time we stop there, thinking streaming worship is enough. But if we are considering how these tools might support, for example, a church who has trouble convincing a clergy person to move to town or can not afford full-time ministry, we have to ask how the rest of the work of the community can be fed/supported/nurtured online. So I was really looking forward to this book that promised to move beyond the live stream.

I was somewhat disappointed, more on that later.

In this short little volume Jones pushes the reader to see Social Media in ways beyond merely another advertising tool to get people to attend in-person events/activities. She reminds us that community can be built online as well. It won’t be the same but it is real. This is something many of us struggled with during the early stages of Covid-19 as we were barred from gathering in-person. How could we be a community without being together in the same space?

In the post-lockdown world the question still lingers. Jones would likely point out that some had started to embrace that question long before March 2020. For a variety of reasons there are some people who prefer (or are only able) to join a community in virtual/online space. How can we make that a full experience of community? I note that she also works (or worked not sure of timelime) for Facebook and much of the book is explicitly talking about how to use Facebook for social ministry. It started to feel a bit like an ad for Facebook at times. This was one of the disappointments.

Disappointing as it might have been, I think Jones raises several good points about what is needed to create a true ministry presence online. I think she is right about the limitations of many platforms to create a safe place for building community and relationships. I am less certain that Facebook is as good for it as she claims (and am relatively certain it might be getting worse as AI slop invades the atmosphere). It is a real challenge to see Social Media as something other than an advertising tool.

The other disappointment I had in the book was that it was treating the online space as creating a separate campus for a church, in the same way that a large church might set up a second (or third or fourth) physical location. With this approach the online church starts to need a whole staffing/support structure that many churches can not (or will choose not to) provide. A small church with one (or no) pastor or staff that wants to create an online side to the community will not be able to designate a pastor for that part of the community. Much of the discussion of how to move from social media to social ministry seemed to assume a much larger church structure than many readers would have.

Still I want to know how we use online tools to build a community, either as a stand-alone or more likely as an adjunct part of the in-person community. How can we use online tools (be that Facebook pages and groups, Zoom, Instagram, or...) to facilitate community building, spiritual growth, Christian Education, stewardship/opportunities to serve as well as Sunday worship? How can online ministry help the church that has no pastor, or the one who only has a pastor onsite half-time? This book raised good issues and questions. It is sorting out those learnings from the sales pitch on one (plausibly one very good) answer that is the challenge I need to meditate on some more.

Book Review Both/And: Maximizing Hybrid Worship Experiences for In-Person and Online Engagement

 

Both/And: Maximizing Hybrid Worship Experiences for In-Person and Online Engagement By Jason Moore. ©2022 Invite Press 204 pages

This book grew out of the reality of COVID-19 and the changes pushed on churches by the lock down. Of course many places had been doing some form of hybrid worship long before March 2020 but many of us were suddenly pushed to do worship differently in that month. And then as the world moved into the later stages of the pandemic many of us decided (either intentionally or by default – more on that later) to continue with some form of hybrid worship. Whether we were/are doing it well might be a whole other question.

In fact that is one of the questions I brought with me into Sabbatical, which is why this volume ended up on my reading list. I am instinctively convinced that hybrid worship needs to mean more than simply streaming what happens in the sanctuary on Sunday morning, but am not entirely sure what I think needs to be done differently. I was hoping this book would help me sort that out.

It did and it didn’t.

Moore affirms my thoughts that we need to do things differently. He draws out questions and concerns that had not occurred to me and ones that had but not at a conscious level. At the same time, many of the suggestions he presents for how to do things differently seem like they only work within specific worship structures, with a bigger volunteer/staff team, and with far different technology than some of us work with. So the questions were good. The suggestions made logical sense. The challenge is how to adapt them to the context (worship style, team size/expertise/comfort, technology available) where one is.

One of the key pieces I took from the book was the idea that we are serving different audiences. We have the people who are in the room. We have the committed church folk who, for a variety of reasons, who are not in the room but are on-line instead. We have the people who are using the livestream as a way to check us out, to test this as a possible faith community. We have those who drifted away, or left more intentionally, who are wondering about coming back. There are probably more subsets as well. We also have the reality that some will join online as the service is happening, and some will join when their schedule fits better. How do we build hybrid worship that meets these various needs? How do we make all feel welcomed, included as participants rather than observers? How do we keep them engaged? What language opens or closes doors? What pieces work really well on screen but not in the room, and vice versa? In the end it becomes an inclusivity question.

Another piece that kept occurring to me, particularly early in the book, was that maybe improving the experience for the online side of the hybrid worship equation will improve it for the in-person side as well. Maybe that hit me because it ties in to my ongoing pondering of “does our current worship order actually work?” (or maybe who does it work for and who doesn’t it). Can worship (on-line and in-person) be more interactive and participatory? How? Changing worship is always a bit of a tightrope to walk, but worship styles/patterns need to evolve and change over time.

Then there was the key question, the one many of us may not have spent much time on. Why are we doing hybrid worship? There are lots of answers to this. There are also people who, in 2022/23 were saying “OK we can stop now so all those people will come back”. It is possible that we need to talk about why we see the need/why we are called to be hybrid churches (or the reverse) as we move forward into a new era. I appreciated Moore’s suggestion that one of the reasons for hybrid worship is as a way of living out the Great Commandment, seeing it as much as outreach as service to the current members of the community.

It is my belief that the church of the future will need to be a hybrid church. This is about worship and about everything else we do. Generally speaking we (clergy and laity alike) have been well-trained to be church in one way. We need to learn a new way. There are churches that are primarily (or only) on-line. That is not what most of us are looking for. We need to figure out how to be Both/And.

"Bible-Based" Culture

 All the time there are voices around us calling for a change to build a society based on "Biblical Values" or a "Biblical Worldview".

SOmetimes those voices become louder or more prominent than others. One example of this would be Turning Point USA and Charlie Kirk. Another would be last week's Alberta Christian Leadership Summit. [SIde Note, a friend and colleague of mine attended this Summit and here are his thoughts.]

Now there are a number of problems with this quest to build society on some "Biblical Worldview".  Among them:

1. It is arguable that there is not one Biblcal Worldview, that the full text of Scripture contains multiple worldviews
2. It is not in doubt that in modern Christianity (in North America these voices always claim to speak for all of 'true' Christians) there are multiple understandings of what one means by Biblical Values or a Biblical Worldview
3. In a pluralistic world it is wholly inappropriate to build society around one religious set of standards
4. Theocracy damages both the faith community and tradition it claims to support and the pluralistic community it is imposed upon.

However I do believe that as people who are guided and informed by our faith we are called to consider the type of world God would have us live in. As people who pray "thy kingdom come on earth" we have an obligation to consider what we mean.

So from time to time I do ponder what a society shaped by Biblical values (as I understand them) might look like...

Such a society would be shaped wholly by love of Creation, the world that God loves.
It would be a place where the newcomer, the stranger, the wanderer, the refugee, the immigrant would be welcomed into the community.
It would not be about enforcing homogeneity, it would name and accept pluralism.
Discussions of Human Sexuality would be focussed on respectful relationships instead of rules and traditions
In this society there would be strong rules and laws ensuring that all are provided for, that their basic needs are met. In Torah there were rules about not harvesting too well, to leave produce for the gleaners to find later -- what is the 21st century equivalent of gleaning?
We would take seriously the stewardship of the earth as commanded in Genesis, we would only take what we need as commanded with the manna in Exodus.
We would know that allowing great inequality is a problem.
We would encourage sharing of things in common so that all would benefit (See Acts 2)
We would be encouraged to subsume self in favour of community, or at least to find a new balance between the two. WE not ME

WHat might you add?

How I hope to Spend my Summer...

As part of marking 25 years of Ordained ministry this year I am taking a Sabbatical leave. When I requested the time I said this:

...plan to take the time to look into newer ways of being the church in an increasingly digital world. This would include some reading (starting with David Lochhead’s ahead-of-its-time book Theology in a Digital World if I can get my hands on a copy) and interviewing people who have/are been involved in online work within the church...This investigation can include looking at both “how can we be a hybrid church” and different ministry models in a world where more places can not afford full-time ministry. Obviously this is an area that could quickly become a D.Min level project so some paring down of ideas will have to happen.

Now as I find myself 2 months away I find I should maybe give some thought to what this might look like. When I was ordained in 2001 there was not much talk about how the internet might change how we do church. It was still really Internet 1.0 at the time. There were some websites starting to pop up sharing prayers and sermons, some churches were experimenting with webpages. 3 years earlier Wood Lake Books had published a book called Get Me to the Church Online which was a listing of churchy websites -- I am sure many of the websites in the book are now defunct, I think I left my copy in Atikokan when we moved in 2010. Social Media and widespread online video conferencing were a few years in the future. I have no memory of any discussions at seminary about how the internet might impact our ministries.

Leap forward 25 years and the reality is soooooooo different. Through things like Zoom and Google Meets and Microsoft Teams (and Skype before them) many of us attend meetings virtually rather than by driving to the location, a real boon for those serving outside major centers. Those same technologies allow for Bible Studies where people out of town can take part. Particularly since COVID many churches now livestream their worship services thereby increasing the number of people who can take part in those experiences. Some do this simply with a stream on YouTube, FacebookLive, or Vimeo, others have chosen something like Zoom where there is more opportunity to be interactive. There are, or at least were, arrangements made where multiple churches can worship together with different spots doing different parts of the service. There was (I think still is) an entirely online congregation within the United Church. I know of one place where the minister alternates between a period onsite and a period at home but interacts with the church digitally. As it has in many parts of our culture, the Internet has transformed the ways we can do church.

I think the church uses online community in at least a couple of ways. One is marketing. Facebook pages, Instagram feeds, TikTok, websites... all are ways of getting our name and image out there. We need to explore how best to make use of these tools. That might be part of what I explore this summer

The other way we can use the online reality is to make it part of how we are a community of faith. How do these tools help us build community? As I look at that questions I am wondering how to fit the answers into a couple of frameworks. One is the 5 marks (or Core Ministries) of the church: Liturgia, Koinonia, Didache, Diakonia, and Kerygma. How does/can online community work with offline community to feed each of those? The other is the framework laid out by Janet Gear in Undivided Love. Gear talks about the different tables that are gathered at the Banquet of faith: Evangelical, Ecclesial, Missional, Ecumenical, and Spiritual. How can online community work with offline community to feed each of them?

Hmm still sounds a bit too broad. We will see what comes of it. Because the purpose of Sabbatical is not just to find work.

AS one of my colleagues said to me, Sabbatical is also about Sabbath. So part of the time will be finding other, non-church, things in life. This should include trying to improve my physical shape (otherwise I have to start replacing wardrobe). It might include relearning what I once knew about piano and guitar. It will include some family time. Maybe even getting a chance to visit camp again????

SO that is the hope/plan/dream for four months this year. I wonder what it will end up being in reality???

A Letter to the Local MP Regarding Conversion Therapy

RE: Bill C6 An Act to amend the Criminal Code (conversion therapy)

Mr Warkentin,
Grace and peace to you this fine February afternoon.

I hear that you are meeting with the Grande Prairie Ministerial Association this Thursday to discuss any concerns the members may have with Bill C6, the much needed legislation to limit and almost ban Conversion Therapy in Canada. I am unable to attend that meeting but I wanted to share my thoughts and feelings on the legislation with you.

I am asking you to support the proposed legislation. I can see no moral, ethical or theological grounds for offering, providing or condoning conversion therapy. Some years ago some members of your party espoused the creation of a “barbaric practises” hotline. As conversion therapy is something that damages the mental and spiritual health of people I would list it as something reportable should such a hotline exist.

We all play many roles in our lives. As I write this letter I want to offer comments from the perspective of the two central roles I play in my life: that of a clergy person and that of a parent.

I have been in ordained ministry for 20 years this May. Before that I was raised in a family that was very active in the church. Learning what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ has been part of my existence since before I can remember. The Gospel has shaped my understanding of what it means to live in community with others. In the hymn to Creation that we find in Genesis 1 the ancient poet shares that humanity is created in the image of God, and that God calls that has been created very good. This tells me that wherever one may find themselves on the spectrum of sexual orientation or whatever one’s gender identity is we all carry within us the imago Dei, the image of God. Conversion therapy seems to suggest that God made a mistake in creating my neighbours who are LGBTQ+. Who are we to make that claim? At the same time the primary Christian ethical principle, indeed the primary commandment given by Jesus, is that we are to live love for our neighbours, family, friends and enemies. Openly choosing to engage in a practise that is known to be hurtful and damaging to another is in direct contravention of this principle and therefore contradicts the Gospel.

From following discussions in various other places on this issue I am aware that many of my colleagues across the country in various denominations see the ban on conversion therapy as infringing on freedom of religion. Specifically they seem to want to hold to a traditional belief that to be LGBTQ+ is sinful, that LGBTQ+ individuals are flawed, and that the church has a duty to bring them back to the correct way of being. I categorically reject this argument. To begin with LGBTQ+ folk do not choose who they are. They are born and created (in God’s image) as the person they discover themselves to be. Further, discussion of rights is never a discussion of absolutes. Rights are almost always about balancing between competing claims. In the case of conversion therapy the rights of people not to be subjected to harmful treatment far supersedes the rights of a religious institution to hold onto outdated and harmful beliefs.

I fully believe that God is still speaking to the world in a variety of ways and one of the things I have heard God saying is that traditional attitudes toward LGBTQ+ folk need to be changed. In the past the church has been very sure that God condoned racism and sexism. The church has, to a large degree, realized that this is not what God wants for the world. We have come to see the sinfulness of racist and sexist attitudes and actions. Heterosexism and transphobia are just as sinful as racism and sexism. We are called to repent of our sinfulness and take a different road forward. As a person of faith, as a person called to leadership within a faith community, I call on the church to put heterosexism and transphobia aside and see God’s image in all our neighbours. Actively working against conversion therapy is part of how we do that.

Now I speak as a parent, father of 4. This would be a role you and I both have in life, one we share with countless others across the country and around the globe. I ask you, what parent would ever want their children subjected to something that intentionally does them harm? If one of my children were wrestling with trying to understand who they were as a sexual being the last thing I would wish for them is condemnation and attempts to change them. I would want them to be surrounded by people who would support them as they discover who they are and live into that reality. That reality may be to name themselves as heterosexual, or it may be some other orientation. It may mean they claim the gender assigned at their birth or it may not. My job as a parent is to support them in who they are. My experience as a parent shapes my hope for all the children of the world. I want them to be assured of that sort of loving support as they live into who God created them to be. Conversion therapy, telling people that they need to change who they are to match some traditional understanding of what is ‘correct’, is antithetical to this vision of loving support and acceptance.

Conversion therapy damages people. Over the years many LGBTQ+ folk have suffered greatly at the hands of society members who refused to see them as the beloved children of God, made in God’s image, that they are. We have made great progress as a society, we have a ways to go yet. Banning conversion therapy is another needed step along the road to the Reign of God. Therefore I once again ask you to support Bill C6 when it comes to a vote in the House of Commons and to actively encourage your fellow Members of Parliament to support it as well.

Peace be with you.
Rev. Gord Waldie B.Ed M.Div

A Tough Movie

Yesterday afternoon a group of us went to see Indian Horse.

This is a movie that pushes the viewer to face the reality that was and is the Indian Residential School system. And pushes us to remember it is not ancient history. As one person said afterward "this was in my lifetime" -- it starts in 1959 and we push through 30 years of Saul's life.

The movie is the story of a small boy, Sau l Indian Horse. And to be honest his is really the only character in the movie that is very well developed. The others are developed only so much as they interact with Saul, though since the movie is told as Saul sharing his memories of his story that does make a deal of sense.

This is a tough movie to watch. It is disturbing to know that such violence and racism are a part of our identity as Canadians. It is one thing to know it happened, it is a whole other level of disturbing to see it enacted. But for that same reason it is a very important movie to see. Over the last decade Canada has officially been taking part in a truth and reconciliation process. But I have a strong hunch that settler-stock Canadians have yet to fully understand the truth (but want to rush to the reconciliation). If we are going to be serious about reconciliation we have to honestly name and recognize the truth of our past and our present [because racism is still a big factor in Canada].

Violent beatings, degrading treatment, inhumane conditions, belittling language. These run through the movie, these run through Saul's life. There are deaths, there is alcoholism, there is the glimmer of one teacher who seems to be a "good guy" and yet he also is part of the problem...

In fact it is hard to say there is much hope in this movie.  There is a lot of reason for despair. There is a lot of reason to think reconciliation is impossible. But hope? That is hard to find.

Where is the hope for reconciliation in Canada? IT lies beyond the pain.  I see on the film website that they are open to community screenings. I am going to suggest that the church host such a screening with a time for debrief and discussion afterward.  The piece I was pondering  was what age. Would it be appropriate for the church youth group? I think so but it would have to be carefully planned and plenty of attention paid to how the post-viewing discussion would be handled.

I think this is an important movie. I also think many people will find it too hard to watch.

Of Rights, and Parents, and Children and GSA's and Confidentiality.

In the middle of October we had Municipal elections here in Alberta. That means the city/town/county councils were elected and so too were local school boards (both public and separate). And a significant subset of those running for school trustee were running on a concept of "protecting (or preserving or restoring) parental rights". Which might have made sense if those rights were somehow under attack, or if those rights automatically trumped the rights of their children.

Maybe a little bit of history first...

A few years ago there was a great uproar in Alberta about the presence or absence of Gay-Straight Alliances (GSA) in schools.  Because in the minds of some having a GSA "promotes the Gay agenda". Out of those discussions it was made law that any school where a GSA was requested, presumably by the students, was required to facilitate and support the creation and operation of said group.

Then there came the issue of transgender students. Another uproar (started by the face that one of the largest Separate Boards n the province had a very public dispute over how to best serve the needs of a transgender student when it came to bathroom and change room issues. And so all school boards were required to submit a plan for how said needs would be met.

[SIDEBAR: Lost in this whole fight, which was really our equivalent of the "bathroom bill" argument that has happened in many places was the fact that school washrooms have been unsafe places for decades. How many people have been bullied in school washrooms over the years? A simple solution for new construction is to do away with multi stall washrooms altogether. Instead have a series of self-contained (full wall, full door) single user water closets with a set of sinks in the adjoining hallway. Then many issues around washrooms get resolved at once]

THe next salvo in the battle was teh supposed parental rights piece. SOmeone got it in their head that parents have a right to know everything their children do at school. And so the parents ave a right to know if their child joins a GSA, or expresses that they are questioning their sexuality or gender identity, or comes out as non-heterosexual or non gender conforming. Further this right somehow exists regardless of whether said child is comfortable with their parents being told.

Understandably there are some of us who find this understanding troubling, and potentially dangerous.

I  think parents do have a right (and duty and responsibility) to be involved in the lives of their children and teens. I also believe that those children and teens have rights about who knows what about their lives. And sometimes those rights will come into conflict. What do we do when rights conflict? Do we claim (as I see the parental rights lobby doing) that one set trumps the other? Or do we recognize that  rights are rarely absolute and that there is a need to negotiate how competing/conflicting rights will coexist? In the case of children and youth I think we will find that the balance point is going to vary based on the age/maturity/development of the child/youth. There are times when parents will need to be told something a child would rather they not hear but only when it is to protect the safety (physical, emotional or mental) of the child/youth. Not just because the parent thinks they need or want to know.

Besides, I am confused. In the recent leadership election for our official opposition one of the candidate stated that parent should be told if a child joins a GSA. To which others said he wanted to out LGBTQ children/youth (note that I am sure said candidate has few qualms about outing LGBTQ folk and he has a history of supporting heterosexist political positions). But simply joining a GSA says absolutely nothing about one's sexuality. It says that you believe all your classmates should be supported. If only LBGTQ folks joined a GSA it would 't exactly be a Gay Straight Alliance would it?

I am a parent, of 4. I have seen no sign that my rights as a parent are being threatened by the school system. If anything I think that we are over-accomodating in one instance. PArents have the authority (backed up by court rulings under parental rights clauses) to have their children exempted from sexuality education (which if done well not only includes the "facts of life" and contraception but also information around sexual orientation and consent and gender identity. No reason must be given just upon a request the child can be exempted (so the objection could be religious, or it cold be that the parent finds it "icky" or that the parent does not want to admit their child is ready.needs to learn the concept...). I am not sure that this is in the best interests of the child or of society as a whole.

I just don't get it. What I do maintain is that when these decisions are made the primary consideration is not what parents like/do not like. The primary consideration of educational decisions is what is best for the student. Sometimes that means keeping confidentiality (which is not the same as keeping a secret, it is recognizing that we each have our own story and need to have the right to share it as we are comfortable). SOmetimes it will mean helping a student get to teh point of being able to share that story for themself. And in very rare occasions it might mean breaking confidence to ensure the safety of the student. But the primary piece is the well-being and safety of the student. Parents are actually second in this discussion of rights.

Book 25 of 2016-- The Sabbath World

Sometimes when looking for one thing you find something totally different and are so glad you did.  That, often, is the essence of book shopping (for me at least).

I forget what I was looking for when I found this volume but the title intrigued me and I bought it. It then sat in digital limbo for a few months until just after I returned from Sabbatical. In theory it would have made more sense to read a book about Sabbath before Sabbatical leave but who wants to be logical all the time?

In part the book is a history of Sabbath and Sabbatarianism.  In part it is the author's autobiographical account of her struggles with the Sabbath of her Jewish heritage. In part it is a reflection on what Sabbath does/could mean in a world that appears to have left the concept in the dust.

It is a really good read.

Sabbath is a topic I wrestle with a fair bit. I remember a couple of years ago when WalMart was moving to 24/7 hours for the Christmas season I posted in a FB discussion that this was not needed and that it was not healthy to think it was needed.  Suffice to say I was a minority in the discussion (You are really weird was one comment as I recall). It is very anti-cultural to suggest that Sabbath is a good idea these days.

I also remember as a young teen the debate in this province over Sunday shopping (trust me that ship has left port for so long the port has been dismantled).

Near the end of the book Shulevitz raises the question of whether Sabbath time should be legislated again. It is an interesting question.  I really do think that we would be a healthier culture if we turned the taps of commerce off for a day, or even a portion of a day each week. Not just as individuals but communally.

And yet how do you do it? I think that North American culture has gone to a place where it is no longer possible to get back the idea of Sabbath time. The wheel of commerce grinds on inexorably. And how would you choose which day? In a pluralistic culture we can't link it to any faith observance (which makes me also wonder how we still get away with making Statutory holidays of Christian observances).

I will continue to wrestle with Sabbath.  I will continue to wrestle with it on a personal level (because I rarely take a day of Sabbath time) and on a communal cultural level.

This book was a part of that wrestling.

Book 21 of 2016 -- The Church, Change and Development

The Church, Change and Development  
Ivan Illich (Urban Training Center Press) 125 Pages

In the spring I was asking on Facebook for possible books around Community Development. One of my colleagues sent me to a PDF link of this (free) book. Free books are almost always worth the cost so....

Until downloading this book I had never heard the name Ivan Ilich. Then he ended up as one of the people discussed in the last book I read. So as I was reading this I had to look him up and learn more about him.

It was an interesting piece. The book itself is a selection of letters, papers and speeches from the 1960's. They largely focus on Catholic mission work in Latin America but there are insights that also fit a broader (and later in time) context. Indeed in reading the first paper (which is the on the book is named for) I was struck by how prescient Illich is in describing both the era of his writing and the eras that followed.

Illich does a good job of pushing the church-folk he is working with (or possibly against?) to consider seriously the context in which they act. He also pushes them to consider seriously the ways in which their actions might actually be damaging to the people with whom they are working. He challenges the assumptions made about mission work and actively calls the church to focus on the needs of the people.

In the end, for my purposes anyway I found the first paper the most useful. The others were interesting reading and had some good insights but were a bit to narrowly focused for me.

Book 20 of 2016 -- Looking Back to Look Forward

Asset Based Community Development (ABCD): Looking Back to Look Forward: In conversation with John McKnight about the intellectual and practical heritage of ABCD and its place in the world today.
                  Cormac Russell

This is a short little read. The majority of it is transcribed (and one would assume edited) conversations with John McKnight about the people who have influenced him in his work around Asset Based Community Development.

And yet in this short little read I made 37 highlights. The print version is 80 pages so that would be roughly one every 2 pages. It is a short book with a wealth of insight into community and social development and systemic reform.

I like the idea of the Asset Based approach. It pushes us to ask what we have rather than what we lack. It pushes us to realize that we do in fact have what we need to change and develop our communities. And in this book the reader is challenged to rethink their understanding of how the systems around them work and the whole “it has to be like this” idea that often accompanies systems.

In the church we are often unaware of the systems we have built. We are also good at insisting we do not have any resources with which to make change. For some time now I have thought we need a new way of looking at things. Our systems are not working. We are not aware of all the resources we have (or –more importantly– how they might be used in new and innovative ways). If the present system/way of being is not producing the results we want, why do we want to keep tweaking it instead of building a new system?

I see myself referring back to this book in the near future.

Book 15 of 2016 -- Getting To Maybe

Getting to Maybe: How the World Is Changed

Frances Westley, Brenda Zimmerman, Michael Quinn Patton (Canada: Vintage Canada) 258 Pages

Change, they say, is the only constant in life. But managing (and possibly even directing) change is a really challenging piece of work.

The first thing I really liked about this book is that it is so honest. It is honest that social change/innovation is about complex systems. Not simple. Not just complicated. But complex, intertwined, always changing. This is a piece that we often miss in trying to start or direct change. We treat the system as if it is much more straight-line than human interactions ever are.

Another thing that makes this book so approachable is that it uses lots and lots of stories. Stories make it so much more real.

The title is an interesting choice for a book about change. In our results-driven, success-oriented culture maybe, at first glance, seems to be a mid-point at best. Shouldn't this be about getting to success? Or getting to completion? Or getting to yes? But the authors are clear that in a complex system where uncertainty is a given that maybe is the actual goal. Success is not a given ever, and in fact that methodology outlined in the book points out that learning from things that do not go according to plan is part of how social innovation works.

One of the things that struck me while reading this book was that we spend a lot of time in the United Church talking about the need to be innovative, to try new ways of being the church. And I agree. But more than once as I was reading this very well-laid out description of how social innovation works my thought was (and we in the church do just the opposite”. As an example, the authors talk a lot about the best way to approach evaluation in social innovation – not results oriented, not about meeting indicators, not goal oriented, more about what is learned in each step of trial But in the church, as in so much of the rest of society, we are results and goal oriented, we want to see obvious and measurable results (preferably immediately). Unfortunately, the authors suggest, (and I agree) focusing on those sorts of things too soon is a great way to kill actual innovation, which is about risk-taking. Or on the other side, there are those in the church who are great at hope and vision but not so great at actually looking at the world around the realistically – another way to kill effective social innovation the authors point out. I think the church could learn from these people.

Book 7 of 2016 -- The Abundant Community

TheAbundant Community: Awakening the Power of Families and Neighborhoods

John McKnight and Peter Brock (San Francisco: Barrett-Koehler Publishers) 170 pages

What does it take to build a strong community? What gets in the way of that happening?

It occurs to me that these are two key questions that we, as churches and as communities in general, need to take seriously as we try to imagine what sort of a society we want to live in. Because, to be brutally honest, I am feeling more and more that the idea of community is falling more and more by the wayside with each passing decade. Maybe it is because of the drive to be “productive”. Maybe it is because we have decided to over-schedule ourselves. Maybe it is because we don't trust the people around us anymore (although arguably that is also a result of not having strong community-mindedness – bit of a chicken/egg spiral there) and so often believe that we are to live in a level of fear all the time. Maybe it is because we are so much more of a mobile (or even transient) society – building strong community often takes time and rootedness. Maybe it is because, as McKnight and Brock claim, we have moved from being 'citizens' to being 'consumers'.

At any rate, it is harder and harder to find people who live in a truly encompassing and supportive community. 20 years ago when I was working in a crisis nursery I quickly learned some of the costs of that lack of community. When I was growing up there were a number of people (largely from the church congregation in our case) who could care for my sister and I in case of emergency (or in the case of a planned trip) or people who could share each others' struggles and offer wisdom and support. The people I was talking to on a crisis line had no-one. The lack of community put them into an even deeper crisis. And even then, in the 1970's and 80's I think we could see that community was different than it had been for my grandparents' generation.

In this volume McKnight and Brock begin by outlining the difference between living as 'citizens' where we take ownership for issues, where we live in a more community-building mindset and living as 'consumers' where we go out to buy goods and services to resolve our issues (or possibly to hide from them), where we rely on professionals rather than the community. They suggest that in following the path into consumers we have put much of the strength and wisdom of the community behind us, that maybe we have even lost much that used to come naturally to us as people. They then lay out an alternative way of life, and start to give the readers a map that would take us back to living in the “abundant [and competent] community” where we re-learn that we have the gifts and tools and skills within our communities and associations to live healthy productive lives.

Over and over as I was reading this book two thoughts occurred to me. One was that this is the sort of book that municipal politicians need to read. If we want our communities to be stronger than our leaders need to see a different way of building them. The other is that these are the sorts of things that communities of faith should be doing almost automatically. The church can be a force for modelling a different for of interaction. Much of it we still do just because that is how we are. I fear that we are, even in the church, starting to lose the full sense of what community can be and accomplish.

One of the challenges of following this approach in this century, I think, is going to lie in how we define community. Is it the neighborhood in which we live? Yes, and much of what McNight and Brock talk about works well in that milieu. Is it the groups of which we are a part? Yes (they talk of these as our associations). BUT community today is also something different and broader when we consider the on-line world. In many ways the whole on-line phenomenon is a product of the consumer mindset. But can it also be placed into the paradigm of the abundant, caring community? And how? It would be interesting to ask the authors that question....

Book 5 of 2016 -- Already Missional

Note: I have also written a piece for the church newsletter based on my reading of this book, you can find it here.

AlreadyMissional: Congregations as Community Partners

Bradley T. Morison (Eugene: Resource Publication, 2016) Pp.123.

One of the key ideas in the world of the church these days is that we need to be missional. Rather than sit and wait for people to come and find out what wonderful people we are we need to be out there actively engaging the community around us, Then people will know who we are and have an incentive to find out more about us.

Which is great. And to be honest I am unsure when this was not the case. Certainly my lived experience of the church has been more of sitting and waiting and assuming that our mere presence is enough to draw folks in. I have not noticed that this approach has been all that effective in my life time – maybe we were always supposed to be missional.

There is a question of how we engage the community. Are we talking about being evangelists and proselytizers, knocking on doors asking folk if they have found the meaning of life? That is certainly one way of being missional and engaging the community. I suggest it is not a way that fits well with most United Church folk. I would also suggest that it is not, in the end, exceptionally effective.

There is another way to engage. This is for the church to become active in the community, to become an active part of trying to make the community around it a better place. This is an approach that is much more attuned to the ethos of the United Church as I understand it. But it raises a whole new set of questions.

Traditionally the missional discussion involves trying to decide what new programs the congregation will offer to the community. Or maybe what formal partnerships the congregation will make with existing organizations. And those are fine ideas. But all too often this approach to being missional leads to the congregational leadership saying to the (already busy) members of the congregation “if we want people to know about us we all have to commit X hours and Y dollars to making this new project work”. And there is the biggest hurdle. How many good ideas have fallen by the wayside because of a lack of resources? The other common problem with these discussions is that there is a tendency for them to involve the repeated use of phrases like “well in they ...” or “Years ago we used to...”. Great. Good for them. But is that something that meets the needs of community where and where you are now?

In this book Brad offers a third alternative. Put simply it starts with asking folk what they are already doing. Church folk in general and United Church folk in particular tend to be very active in the community already. Some of that activity is going to grow out of their faith, to grow out of their understanding of how God would have us live. Normally we fail to recognize that as ministry (both as those doing it and as the church). Having offered that understanding of what it means to be missional, Brad asks the reader to explore a series of questions about how we encourage people to live out the ministries in which they already participate, how the church can recognize those ministries as part of the larger ministry of the congregation, and how the church can support people in their ministry.

This is a book the cries to be read and discussed in a group setting. It is an interesting read for an individual but its power is when a group, say a congregational governing body (and/or the power-brokers—who may or may not be the same people), reads it together and talks about how that congregation might put these ideas into practice.

I have known many people in different places who are active participants in the missio Dei. Sometimes this work is through the church, often it is just because they have a passion for it. Maybe it is time we as the church started to embrace what is already happening rather than think ministry only counts when we can guide and measure and contain it?

Safe. Legal. Rare.

Can you guess what that refers to?

I suppose it could be a number of things.  But in this case it is my position on abortion.

Last week we had our monthly meeting of the Ministerial Association (technically this was the March meeting but because of Holy Week [our regular meeting is the last Tuesday of the month] we postponed to April 2).  One of the guest speakers was the president of Voice for Life.

During this presentation there was a story equating German churches who were silent about the holocaust and chose to not hear the cries of its victims with people of faith who choose not to speak out against the right of women to make choices about their own health -- because the right to choose is just the same as genocide you know.  Then there was a handout trumpeting how wonderfully successful the USan anti-choice movement has been recently because of the high number of pieces of anti-choice legislation that have been passed in the last two years (not mentioning that some of those pieces of legislation involve violations of women's rights, intelligence, and bodies).  Then comes the kicker in their argument.

Canada has NOTHING in the Criminal Code dealing with legislation.  Hasn't had for 25 years, as this link explains [yes I know Wikipedia is not the most academically sound source, but everything else that popped up in a Google search came from a clearly pro or anti organization].  And yes that means that legally abortions can occur at any point in a pregnancy.  Even up to birth.  Now most sources I have seen over the years point out that the VAST majority take place early.  And a miniscule number occur in the last trimester.  But apparently that is not the point.  The point is that they CAN happen, not whether they actually do.  And so the Canadian anti-choice movement is advocating for a new law to be written.

Not gonna happen.  Yes I know there are elements within the Conservative Party of Canada that would love that to happen.  Some of them draft motions in Parliament that are obvious attempts to bring abortion restrictions in through the back door -- such as decrying sex-selection abortion.  But for all the low respect I have for the current Prime Minister I think he is too smart to try and bring in such a law.  And frankly I am fine with that.

Which brings us to safe, legal, and rare.  I was really tempted to ask (but didn't-why stir things up needlessly) what people around that table were willing to do to get to rare in the continued absence of legislation.  Comprehensive sexuality education?  Increased access to birth control?  Guaranteed annual income?  Well funded and subsidized child care?  Support for adoption?  That is how you get to rare.  Not by making it illegal.  Not by making decisions for other people.  By ensuring there are viable other options.

Wholistic Fitness

2 weeks ago we took the 3 older girls to see a local production of CATS (an ambitious choice for a community theater group to say the least).  And they loved it.  But a review of that event is not the purpose of this post.

When talking about the show with my mother she spoke about a radio interview she had heard recently.  In it the interviewee was talking about the need to develop cultural fitness.

That comment taps into a pet peeve of mine. We have pushed the education system in many ways, based on the hot button topics of the day.  Sometimes we have pushed to ensure a baseline amount of physical activity per day or week.  OR we have pushed for more time spent on maths or numeracy.  Or maybe it is science that needs more time.  Or maybe the concern of the era is literacy.  Or maybe technology?  BUt I have yet to hear people complaining that the school system is not doing enough to develop cultural literacy (or fitness as the above interview suggested).  And this is a problem (in my opinion).

Maybe I should name my bias.  25 years ago I was in my first year of university.  I was an Education student with a Drama major.  And I knew that the high school curriculum in this province was changing.  This change was to highlight science.  But the reality was that this round of change would make it very difficult for a student to take all 3 sciences and also carry a Fine Art through all 3 grades of high school.  And those of us who wanted to teach Fine Arts courses were a little disconcerted.

But you see I think we are a poorer society if we do not develop cultural literacy in people.  And to do that you need to do it throughout life.  You can't just expect it to happen as adults.  This is not to say that extra time set aside for physical health, or numeracy or science, or technology or literacy are not important, obviously they are.  But cultural studies and fine arts are equally important in the long term.  In fact it is my belief that one of the requirements for a high school diploma should be at least one fine arts course (music, drama, visual arts whatever).  And in earlier grades a more general introduction not only to performance and technique but also to history and styles of these arts.

Developing a society that is culturally literate will (at the least) help us all do better at trivia games.  Btu I think we will benefit in ways far beyond that. 

By the way the above named changes in emphasis to the education system have had another casualty.  My minor in my BEd degree was social studies (history, geography, civics etc) .  And a lack of emphasis on those subjects also has a detrimental effect on our effective functioning as a society.

So what do we do?  How do we develop an education system that provides a fully wholistic idea of fitness and still have it cost-effective or time-effective?  I don't know.  Given that I also think all students should be heavily encouraged to learn at least one language fluently in addition to their mother tongue and that all Canadian students should have to travel across the country by land as part of their high school education and that all students should have a basic introduction to World Religions (arguably this should be part of the Social Studies curriculum) as a part of basic education I may not be the best person to ask. 

Still we can dream right????