Are We Still Passing the Peace? - Chasing Francis Series

An important part of every Christian worship service is what we call “passing the peace.”

You may think your church doesn’t do this. That is unlikely. In your church the worship leader may say something like, “please shake hands with the person beside you” or, “lets take a moment to greet the folks around us.” These are remnants of a vital part of ancient Christian worship.

“Pax vobiscum.”

“Et con spiritu tuo.”

Christians have used these Latin phrases for nearly two thousand years. Greek-speaking believers have used other words, as ancient, or even more so. Both the Latin and Greek phrases are based on one Hebrew word: Shalom.

That’s what the Lord first said to His disciples after he resurrected, “peace be unto you.”

“Shalom.”

Shalom does indeed mean peace. But it means much more.  To English speakers, peace is the absence of conflict. It is the state of calm or serenity. Shalom however is “well being,” “health,” or “flourishing.” It is much more active than the English word, 'peace', implies.

In Chasing Francis, the pastor’s Franciscan friends tell him that God calls us not only to pursue personal righteousness but to pursue justice for our communities. Justice is righteousness applied to a group. In political terms it means that a Christian believes it is wrong for individuals to commit adultery but also believes it is wrong for communities to ignore the poverty and suffering of the people on' the bottom'. Christians may differ about how to deal with large-scale issues that affect the health and finances of individuals within our communities. However, none of us are free to ignore them.

I live in a Bible-soaked part of the country. Our barns are covered with scripture. Our radio stations are filled with preachers huffing their way through warnings about ungodly living and the mark of the beast. We have been hearing Bible stories in camp meetings and tent revivals for over two hundred years. Meanwhile, our education levels are abysmal. Crystal meth controls entire counties.  Violence is not only excused; it is largely ignored.

Where is the shalom?

Some are doing very well. Some are barely surviving. The people of this area increasingly live in two different realities. They view the world through two different sets of lenses. This division is as evident in the churches as among the unbelievers. That is because the wealthy and the poor go to different churches. And, as George Barna warns us, our poor are quickly becoming unchurched. They no longer believe there is anything in church for them.

Few of our churches seem to think the gospel has much to say about the social infrastructure that used to give people a common platform upon which to interact with one another. Our streetcars are long gone. So, without a car, you can’t get to work. If you have a car though, you must have insurance. You must also pass emissions control. You must also be able to afford gas. If you have a child you must also pay for childcare. If your company does not provide health insurance, you may have to do without health coverage. If you get sick you will have to go to work anyway because you can’t afford to get off the hamster wheel.

Is this shalom?


Yes, eternal issues are more important than temporal ones. However, shouldn’t the gospel affect our hunger to learn, beautify our surroundings and help others out of poverty and despair?

Millions of our fellow citizens are becoming little more than indentured servants. Others are giving up altogether. In the past, this situation created an environment for spiritual renewal and societal reform.

We need that. Our ‘gospel’ is basically a type of fire insurance, get-out-of-Hell-free card; if indeed it is still even that serious. Our churches are defenders of the status quo. We shout about it not being the government’s place to care for the poor while ignoring the fact that our churches rarely dedicate any significant part of their budgets to care for even their own poor, much less for the poor of society.  So in the end, we are saying that the poor are on their own. The government is not responsible. The churches are not responsible. No one is responsible. 

Churches have gotten dangerously close to preaching what the apostle James said some were preaching in his day: saying to the poor “go on your way; be clothed and fed.” This is the gospel of Ayn Rand and not the gospel of Jesus.

I happen to be a Republican.  I have always believed that private structures, formed by concerned citizens, are more effective ways to lift people out of poverty than government programs. I still believe that. But what happens if we all buy into a form of social Darwinism that teaches us to no longer care about those who suffer?

If we accept that doctrine, we will be committing a form of apostasy more repulsive to our Lord than any of the liberal theologies we have been rightly opposing.

Replacing the passing of the peace with a hearty handshake may be an acceptable modern equivalent for worship. However, if we are replacing our Lord’s charge to establish shalom in the world around us with the empty advice to “be clothed and be fed,” then we have replaced what used to be meaningful deeds with meaningless words.

Chasing Francis poses all sorts of questions. It doesn’t answer them, though.  Perhaps it is enough that the questions bite and awaken us. The state of denial that churches have been in have encouraged us to praise Jesus while ignoring the plight of those for whom he died. That can’t continue. It is a false peace, a cheap serenity we maintain by withdrawing ourselves from the struggle to establish shalom for all of God’s children.

May God’s Peace Be With You.

Now please pass his peace on to all those in your world.

Escape From Purgatory - Chasing Francis Series

There is no biblical support for the concept of purgatory, that is if by “purgatory” we mean some sort of halfway house between heaven and hell.

I am going to defend it nonetheless.  Dante was right; it is an undeniable spiritual reality.

In C. S. Lewis’s book The Great Divorce, dead people get on a bus and are given a tour of heaven, hell and purgatory. They are told to choose where they want to live after looking over the options. As it turns out, few of them end up choosing heaven. Most of them find purgatory, or even hell, more to their liking.

Lewis, a Protestant, wasn’t describing purgatory as a geographical reality. He was describing it as a spiritual state. Purgatory is the in-between place.  It is the not-quite-evil but not-yet-good place. It is the place where most of us prefer to live.

Lewis’s story, as he tells us in the preface, is not about the afterlife. He doesn’t know anything more about the afterlife than we do. What Lewis is taking about is this life. We are all on Lewis’s bus. We are constantly avoiding either sainthood or evil. We don’t want to enter the darkness, certainly, but we are not quite willing to abandon it either. 

We keep choosing the in-between place – purgatory.

People like purgatory.

So do churches.

We want our churches to be places of healing, grace, and redemption. We want them to be open to everyone, especially to those who are weary and lost.  But we also want them to be cool.
And prosperous.
And well connected.
And safe.
And ours.

We want our churches to stay in purgatory. Not too much grace. Not too much holiness. Not too much of too much. Just enough goodness to feel good. Just enough light to see, but not enough to see too much.

In Chasing Francis, the pastor, who has taken his church from nothing to great success, makes a turn one day, after which purgatory is no longer possible. Time has run out and he is thrust out of the gray place. He must choose from the other two opinions: from now on it must be either holiness or working a gig; either making a living or living a life. He must either become a conscious fake to keep the noses and nickels rolling in or risk the loss of nickels and noses to do what he believes is right.

Which will it be?

Italy! If there is any place to go when one is running from purgatory it is Italy.

But it is in Italy that he encounters Francis, a fellow preacher from long ago.  Francis knows the way from purgatory to heaven. But how steep his path seems to be!

Everyone loves Francis but who wants to be Francis?

He looks back and forth at his two opinions.

One on hand he sees Francis and his friends. They are teaching, serving, laughing but also suffering, hardly noticed by the powers of the world or the Church but not resenting the indifference of either, singing, painting, dancing, praying, and loving.

On the other he sees Elmer Gantry, Gregory Rasputin, Cardinal Richelieu, and all the other powerful and well-connected clerics of history who have made religion into a power base and a source of personal wealth.

Like so many church leaders, this pastor is uncertain, not quite ready, not yet able to leave the gray place to make a real choice.

Jesus told us once that there is a pearl in a field that is so precious that it is beyond all imagination. It can be ours when we are ready to go get it. But it will require us to sell all we possess to make it ours. We must become saints, in other words.

Of course, we Protestants are usually as nervous about saints as we are about purgatory.

“WE ARE ALL SAINTS!!!” we protest. Francis is no better than Uncle Bob.

Right. Surely we are all called to be saints. The king's little brats are all called to become nobles. But someone must still wipe their little royal behinds and teach them the alphabet. There is some distance between what they are called to be and what they are at the moment. What they are by blood and what they are by character can be quite different.

For now, the little characters can play and enjoy themselves. But time is ticking. There are choices ahead that will soon determine their destiny.  Some will become truly noble and enlighten the world with their acts of wisdom and courage. Most of them will play their entire lives, rolling around in purgatory. Others will become utter fakes, waving at the subjects from the balcony, speaking about glory and beauty. Then they will go into the palace and sit on golden chairs, thinking about whether it might be good to change the décor, even if they must use the part of the royal budget dedicated to schools and pensions.

Ever so often however, someone breaks out of purgatory and runs toward the light.

He is usually declared insane, naïve, idealistic and unstable.

After he dies, we call him a saint.

We make all sorts of stories, books and statues of him here in purgatory.

And every so often, another fool breaks ranks and runs for his life, clutching the most beautiful pearl.

Why Should I Chase Francis? - Chasing Francis Series

A few days ago, I finished Chasing Francis by Ian Morgan Cron.
It was about time. When our minister of music, Christopher Phillips, told me I should read it over a year ago, I ordered it. Then I put it on the shelf. Since that time, it has been patiently waiting for my attention. Fortunately, books are good-natured and will wait years until the reader is ready for them.
Chasing Francis opens with a church explosion. A successful evangelical mega-church pastor has been asking himself if he and his church are really on the right path. Then, one Sunday morning, he asks the question in a sermon. A congregational crisis follows. Board meetings, emails and gatherings of various sorts churn the pastor’s words until everyone in the church feels forced to make a choice about the pastor’s sanity and holiness.

The pastor decides it’s a good time to go to Italy. He has an uncle there, whose decision years before to become a Franciscan had terribly upset his family. He decides to spend a few weeks with this uncle and sort things out.

Meanwhile, things keep churning back home. Pastors start lining up with resumes. Committees meet. Studies are conducted. Opinions harden.

The story brings up several issues within American Christianity; our different definitions of church and faith, piety, poverty and wealth, nationalism and faith, holiness, what we believe is the role of a pastor, the spirituality of beauty, and other things for which we seem to have no common ground.

This morning, I decided this book is an opportunity for me to explore some of these themes. So, I am beginning a series of blogs.

The reasons are probably obvious.

Like the hero (or villain, perhaps) in Chasing Francis, I am a pastor of a large church. I love our church. I am called to lead it. However, I too have misgivings about the path we have been walking. I too wonder sometimes if this path really leads to Christ. For the most part, the ways we have been doing church has helped us adjust to our culture rather than taught us to challenge it. We have become good at helping individuals survive and thrive; we have become poor at calling for the transformation of the self or of the communities in which we live.

Whether or not any of that is true, our younger generations are increasingly disenchanted with what we have done with Christianity. As a result, they are either giving it up or leaving our churches to start over.That leads a pastor to ask what we can do to prepare the churches we lead to remain effective in the days ahead. Most of us realize that getting cooler music and a new lighting platform sure won’t do it.

So, there are days when I think that the solution might indeed be to move to Italy. Of course I don’t have a Franciscan uncle there to live with, so there is the matter of supporting myself …
Ok. Back to the book.
The pastor ends up in Assisi, where he encounters the life and words of Europe’s most beloved saint. He wrestles with Francis, who, like him, ministered in an age of great societal change. He ponders what St. Francis might have to say to a contemporary mega-church like his. He decides Francis would not condemn or scold the people. He would, however, offer an alternative. He would show us through his life that a preoccupation with big, powerful, luxurious and cool is gradually eroding our soul. He would offer beauty, simplicity, joy, and service to others by asking us to follow him.

Like Francis, this author does not yell at us. He woos us toward something many of us have wanted for a long time: to disconnect our faith from technique, manipulation, control, and fear. He encourages us to listen to the words of Jesus. He asks us to consider how to actually live by those words.

He doesn’t seem to care much if our church structures survive. He seems to care about the state of our soul.

Nonetheless, the book is not one of those “lets bash the church and call ourselves cool for being so edgy.” Not at all. This book is as much a rejection of something as it is an awakening to something far better.

I want to write about that for a few weeks.

If you are interested, I invite you to pick up the book and read.

Then we can talk.

And, perhaps with God’s help, we can do more than that.
Perhaps we can take a step toward becoming saints.
For if we catch up to Francis, we will soon see that he is chasing someone else – the one who has been plotting and scheming to make us into saints all along.