An Open Letter to the Current Board and Constituents of United Lutheran Seminary Dear Colleagues, I have been incredibly hesitant to comment publicly on United Lutheran Seminary’s recent controversies and actions out of respect for current leaders there and because I am standing at a distance. Yet because events there have been not only heartbreaking but also, I believe, detrimental to the status and standing of Lutheran theological education in the Northeast, I have chosen to share some of the questions I have. They are, I want to emphasize, questions. This tragic series of events has reminded me to avoid rushing to judgment and to give...

Don’t worry, if you’re not familiar with the term “digital pluralism” you’re not behind the times, out of touch, or manifestly uncultured. Trust me, I should know, as I made this term up! 🙂 What I mean by talking of digital pluralism is to recognize that we live in an era when multiple stories, worldviews, traditions, convictions, and versions of reality now circulate, and even compete, with each other largely because of the advent of digital communication. Think about it in terms of this analogy: a generation ago we had “the Big Three” in television which, truth be told, mostly featured all the...

A few weeks ago, I asked whether the church was really declining. That may seem like an odd question, given the constant bemoaning of attendance and membership declines in mainline congregations, but I pointed to the unparalleled growth of Christianity across the rest of the globe as indicating that perhaps our vision is at times to narrow when we consider God’s work in and through the church. This time, I’d like to suggest that we also at times unnecessarily narrow our vision when thinking about God’s work through the church by limiting our imagination only to congregations. When we do this, we overlook the profound...

I found the following thoughts by Seth Godin provocative: At the congregation down the street, they’re doing things the way they’ve done them for the last few hundred years. Every week, people come, attracted by familiarity, by the family and friends around them, part of a tribe.   And just past that building is another one, a different tribe, where the tradition is more than a thousand years old.   This is not so different from that big company that used to be an internet startup, but all the original team members have long left the building. Work tomorrow has a lot in common with work yesterday, and the safety of it...

Is the church really in decline? I think that depends on how you define “church.” Look, I know that there’s been a lot of ink spilled about the decline of the church in North America. (And I no longer have to modify “church” with “mainline” anymore, as it is indeed the whole church – from liberal to conservative, Roman Catholic to Protestant, evangelical to mainline – that is now in decline.) And I know that the numbers occasioning this spilled ink are pretty much incontrovertible. But here’s the thing (actually two things, the first today and the second next week): Let’s be clear that when we’re talking about church...

…well? And that matters. Because it’s not just about using social media, but using it well. That is, responding to the Digital Age isn’t just a matter of having a Facebook page or semi-lame (or even pretty good) website. Rather, it’s thinking with care about the variety of channels of communication that are available to us today in order to support our people in their Christian walk. Of course, the very thing that makes this moment so amazing in terms of our ability to share the Gospel and equip people for lives of faith – the nearly uncountable number of communication channels available to us – is precisely that which makes...