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So many of the online discussion that I have been engaging in this week seem to landing somewhat on the same question: What is the Church? In a comment in one of those discussions, David Fitch pointed to John Howard Yoder’s answer to this question in his book “Body Politics: Five Practices of the Christian Community Before the Watching World”. The five practices Yoder cites are:
- Binding & Loosing (Discernment & Discipline)
- Disciples Break Bread Together (Eucharist)
- Baptism & the New Community (Baptism)
- The Fullness of Christ (Multiplicity of Gifts)
- The Rule of Paul (Open Meeting)
In the next few weeks, I hope to blog through these practices. While I will obviously be citing Yoder, I hope to give more emphasis to these practices within our own context of Little Flowers Community. My hope is that it will provide a generative space for conversation about living these practices rather than simply engaging them as a set of theoretical ideas or ideals.
So while I hope to do my first post today or tomorrow, let’s start with some questions:
What do you think of the 5 practices listed (understanding that I have not qualified them at all)? Would you exclude any of them?
What practices are essential (not just good) that are not listed above? Why include them?
Excellent. Looking forward to it, especially because I’m currently reading through “Body Politics.”
Great, Eddie! Then I expect a lot more from you than anyone else. (wink)
Love’d Yoder’s book. Look forward to hearing your thoughts on how the book engages life in your community.
Thanks Marco. Obviously we won’t be able to get into the depth I would like, but I hope it generates some discussion that produces some change for us all.
My first thought is that defining church by its practices only gives us one dimension of what it means to be church. The church is a group of people with distinct practices but also distinct values and relationships. The why and the how is just as important as the what. That being said I think the list of practices is good.
Leighton, I agree that practices are just one way of looking at things. It certainly isn’t a fully inclusive discussion. That being said, I believe that broadly exploring practices (and the why behind them) can be far more valuable than primarily engaging theological beliefs. The incarnation suggests that belief is truest when it is lived. I think, though, that we are on the same page.
Further, I would suggest that some practices should be universal- while not in explicit detail, then certainly in a general sense of commonality, continuity and community.
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This question of the relationship between beliefs and practices — I suspect that the answer is found in one of the early church Fathers — Irenaeus. He writes of the Spirit and the Word as “the two hands of the Father in the world.” I take this as a paradigm — we must always hold the Word and the Spirit together, and where we fail to do this we end up with a heresy in belief or practice.
Beliefs – Spirit. The intangible that cannot be seen yet forms the basis of all our action in the world.
Practices – Word. The flesh that takes shape as we act on the movement of the Spirit in the Body.
Thanks Len. That is a helpful way to look at it.