Encouraging news in the war for souls...
If It Can Make It There… http://www.doggieheadtilt.com/if-it-can-make-it-there/ Several years ago, Christianity Today columnist Tim Stafford chided evangelical Christianity “which thrives in Houston but can’t get to first base in Manhattan.” That might no longer be the case. A new survey indicates the gospel has made impressive gains in New York City. If it can make it there, can it make it anywhere? “If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere” is a familiar line from a song that was unfamiliar when it debuted in Martin Scorsese’s 1977 film, New York, New York. A year later, Frank Sinatra popularized it in performances at Radio City Music Hall. The point is simple. If you can make it in a key city such as New York, you make it anywhere. The reverse of the point is not true, however. You can make it in a lot of cities but not necessarily make it in New York. This is essentially the point Tim Stafford made in 1996, when he said Pat Robertson is a metaphor for what’s wrong with evangelical Christianity. Robertson, he wrote, is a “picture of evangelicalism, its strengths and weaknesses.” He’d made it in Virginia Beach, but “doesn’t get much respect” elsewhere and “has all but bypassed the establishment, appealing to the common man and building new institutions from scratch.” Robertson “is relegated to a broadcast ghetto he can’t break out of,” Stafford remarked. “So is evangelicalism, which thrives in Houston but can’t get to first base in Manhattan.”1 Stafford made a good point since the Early Church grew by targeting key cities. In his book Cities of God, historian Rodney Stark writes, “Early Christianity was primarily an urban movement. The original meaning of the word pagan (paganus) was “rural person,” or more colloquially “country hick.” It came to have religious meaning because after Christianity had triumphed in the cities, most of the rural people remained unconverted.”2 By the third century, the Christian population of the Roman Empire had grown very large. As Lucian the Martyr put it early in the fourth century, “[A]lmost the greater part of the world is now committed to this truth, even whole cities.” The thinking was, if the gospel can make it there, in Rome, it can make it anywhere. Targeting urban elites is also how the Enlightenment succeeded. In Philipp Blom’s A Wicked Company: The Forgotten Radicalism of the European Enlightenment, he tells the story of the Enlightenment’s movers and shakers, highlighting how they focused on key cities. One mover was Denis Diderot who wrote revealing letters to his rumored lover Louise-Henriette Volland for almost thirty years, detailing the Enlightenment’s tactics. In one note, penned in 1759, Diderot remarked how his atheism was not for the faint-hearted. That’s why the Enlightenment did well in the cities, he said. The “naturally superstitious,” Diderot believed, “needed their fetishes” and lived in the suburbs. “The people there are too stupid, too miserable, and too busy.”3 Don’t overlook the Enlightenment’s shrewd strategy because of Diderot’s arrogance. Targeting key cities is the same strategy adopted by the Clapham Sect in the same era. This group was part of a movement that started in key cities in the early 1700s and influenced many leaders, including banker John Thornton. Thornton was “said to be the richest man in England,” writes Stephen Tomkins in his book, The Clapham Sect: How Wilberforce’s Circle Transformed Britain. British evangelicals targeted influential urban elites like Thornton, promoting “two great outward channels, saving souls and social action.” This was the movement William Wilberforce joined after coming to faith in 1785. The Clapham evangelicals recognized that “if they were going to evangelize the Church of England and Christianize the nation, they were going to have to woo the ruling classes,” Tomkins writes. The thinking was, if the gospel can make it in London, it can make it anywhere. The Clapham Sect set out to influence elites by reforming institutions (such as banking) and appealing “to the conscience and responsibility of the upper classes.” Forty years later, it left a legacy abolishing slavery and reforming banking as well as child labor laws. Some have said the Age of Wilberforce ushered in the Victorian Age, when faith played a vital part in matters of public life. This commitment to key cities continues to be pursued in more recent evangelical faith communities. In early 1989, a group of 15 people began meeting weekly in an Upper East Side apartment to pray about planting a new church in the heart of Manhattan for professional New Yorkers. Tim Keller joined the group later that year as the first pastor of the fledgling Redeemer Presbyterian Church. Since then, Redeemer has planted hundreds of churches, in the city as well as in key cities throughout the world. Redeemer’s work might contribute to recent trends observed by the Barna Group. Based on analysis of research conducted over the last 14 years by Barna, a research organization, residents of the New York City media market are more spiritually active today than they were in the late 1990s. Reported weekly church attendance, for instance, bottomed out in 1999 and 2000 (31 percent) but has since grown to represent 46 percent of the market’s residents. Furthermore, the percentage of residents of the New York area who are unchurched—defined as those who have not attended a worship service in the last six months—declined from 42 percent to 34 percent. To grasp how significant this is, David Kinnaman, president of Barna reports, “during the same period of time in the nation’s population, church attendance has declined and there has been a corresponding increase in the percentage of unchurched adults.” 6 Tim Stafford called it correctly in 1996 when he said evangelical Christianity couldn’t get to first base in Manhattan. That doesn’t seem to be the case anymore. Redeemer New York City continues the tradition of the Clapham Sect and 18th century evangelicals. If these churches can make it there, it’s more likely the faith can make it anywhere. ___________________ 1 Tim Stafford, “Robertson R Us: Part 2” Christianity Today, August 1, 1996. 2 Rodney Stark, Cities of God: The Real Story of How Christianity Became an Urban Movement and Conquered Rome (New York: HarperOne, 2006), p. 2. 3 Letter from Diderot to Volland, 1759, in Diderot, Oeuvres, vol. 5, Correpondence, 180. 4 Stephen Tomkins, The Clapham Sect: How Wilberforce’s Circle Transformed Britain (Oxford: Lion, 2010), p. 53. 5 Tomkins, Clapham Sect, p. 61. 6Barna Study Explores Faith in New York Since 9-11 (via Instapaper) Sent from my iPhone -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
