Catalyst for change, part one

Here we go with the second day of reading Phyllis Tickle's "The Great Emergence." I've read chapter two and the teaser for section two. And the question that I'm left with is "What happened over the last 100 (or maybe 200) years that would create the need or desire for change in the Christian church?"

But before we get to that, here's what she says (essentially)...

Using the illustration of a cable with an outer coating, an inner sheath and three bound wires, she walks through the process of "re-formation." The outer coating is our larger societal story (I like the word meta-narrative.) the inner sheath is our collective imagination. The three wires are spirituality, corporeality, and morality. She argues that from time to time, something big - a storm of sorts - breaks through the coating and sheath exposing the three wires.

Inquisitive as we are, we begin to explore the three areas of our worshiping selves: the makings of an individual spiritual being, the way that individuals interact in worship corporately, and our moral compasses. (I was a tad confused at where she was going until she said, "We pull each [wire] up, consider it from every possible angle, and at times finger it beyond all imagining. (Consider for example, how many thousands and thousands of Americans over the last fifty years have been vociferously "spiritual but not religious.") One we're satisfied with our understanding of one strand, worry it to death, in time return it to its former place, and take on the third and last strand." (page 37)

So it's about inquisitiveness? Or is it about the blow to the cable in the first place? Is it about mending the breach? I hope all three. But for today, I was left with the question of what caused the breach?

It's not really every 500 years though... the breach happens, it takes awhile to check the three strands out, re-form, and then I would assume a period of rest settles in. So, maybe every 200 years? 100 years? That's why I was left with that question... what happened over the last 100 (maybe 200) years that would create the need or desire for the Christian church to change?

Here's my list (and in no order of importance): the industrial revolution, the creation of the car, train, plane, and the internet which leads to travel which leads to interaction of cultures and the flattening of the world (see Thomas Friedman).

Our meta-narrative has changed and our imagination has exploded and we're left with exposed spirituality, corporeality and morality.