Outlook: What do you observe as you have traveled and spoken to different groups in the PC(USA)?
BRC: People are bringing their youth groups to come hear this new moderator guy at the town hall meetings we’ve been having. I think my election may have signaled some kind of shift that people are yearning for. There is some kind of movement … and it may not have a destination that we know, but it has been given some new life. My role is to help create space for that.
Outlook: What are you seeing about the church as a part of our culture?
BRC: In some ways we as a church have become so irrelevant we are not even worth rebelling against. My voice is one that cares deeply about the church and has been nurtured by it. But I care so much about the church that I think we have to come to some realities of where we stand in the midst of society now and whether or not we want to change that position. When all of our identity is wrapped up in a kind of influence that we don’t have anymore in the culture, then we are living in a bubble that is not really there.
We still feel like we control culture and that is no longer the case. The world is happening to us. Our natural inclination, when that happens, can be to close ourselves off. But if we do that, we close ourselves off from the possibilities. When Abraham and Sarah were told that they were to have children at such an old age, they welcomed the visitors, the strangers, and offered the best they had. When Peter saw Jesus walking on the water his response was, “Let me experience what you are doing.” It was only after that he got bogged down with why this couldn’t work. …
We ought to open up because that will allow us to know what we need to embrace, and it also helps us to know what we need to stand against.
Outlook: One topic on which you have written and spoken is change, particularly as it relates to the church. How is change expressed in your congregation?
BRC: Our session structure changes every year. At the end of each year, it changes. We don’t assume that because we have one structure it is going to last for three years. It’s not even part of our reality. We’re not even disappointed anymore when it does change! Someone asked me, “So you seem to be leading us somewhere, but where are we going?” I told them I don’t know, and I’m totally comfortable in the not knowing, but knowing that we are going somewhere. Even when we get there, we are going to be headed off somewhere else.
Outlook: What can the church, in the midst of its controversies, offer the world?
BRC: If, across the aisles of how ever many issues there are, I can fully believe that you are being faithful to the Christ that you believe in, and it is the same Christ I believe in, but that we have landed in different places — if we can really live in that, then I believe that is what we have to offer the world. The thing is, I wonder if we believe that with each other?
When push comes to shove with the stridence of both the conservatives and the progressives in our denomination, I’m not sure we really believe that the other person is following Christ. If that’s not there, then we’re done. Then what holds us together really is just pensions and property, not a common belief in Jesus.
We seem to have this idea that a common belief means a common discernment of everything. I’m comfortable with saying, if you believe in Jesus as the one who has redeemed you to God, and that’s what drives your life, even if that lands you in a very different place than me, I can live with that. I’m not sure we all can do that. But I think there are a significant number of people who can. Whether or not that number is large enough to change the culture of the church remains to be seen.
Outlook: How has a lack of those commonalities affected the church?
BRC: I think that as a whole we haven’t found joy in being the church in a long time. There are too many people who have learned to bear with church. If we don’t find joy out of the process, then what is the point?
Unfortunately, we seem to be reaping the benefits of that. We have an entire generation saying, “I’m not going to do it. The cultural norm no longer tells me that I have to.”
If we who have been part of the institutional church can find joy in preparing the church for what it is to become, rather than seeing it as giving up the way that I want the church to be, then I think many of these other things fall by the wayside.
