Church

I was brought up to believe that Christianity is about what's happening here and now; it's not just nostalgia for some long-lost times. And that Christ is alive and visible in our world today: that is the meaning, for me, of the Resurrection.

Berlin, Gedächtniskirche

When I found myself at a book event about Guantanamo lawyers on Good Friday, 2010, it occurred to me: this is Christ in the world today, right in front of me.

Around the same time, I started to become more and more insistent that Christ's Church show up and deal with the problems of the world.

One day a friend asked me to explain about what felt compelling to me about Jesus. I tried to think about it in terms of what I saw happening around me right then in Chicago in 2011 and 2012. I had an epiphany: "WWJD? Occupy!"

I also realized I needed to try to figure out what was really meant by the term "good news."

I realized that "how we do church" is an ongoing question . . . and it even has a name, "ecclesiology."

It's time to figure out how to "do church" in the 21st century . . . . 

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Image: Interior of the Gedächtniskirche, Berlin: "The original church on the site was built in the 1890s. It was badly damaged in a bombing raid in 1943. The present building, which consists of a church with an attached foyer and a separate belfry with an attached chapel, was built between 1959 and 1963. The damaged spire of the old church has been retained and its ground floor has been made into a memorial hall. ... The walls of the [new] church are made of a concrete honeycomb containing 21,292 stained glass inlays."