Not Your Father's Commune
Tom Sine
January 1, 2000
"I'm going to church." Not for many generations has that statement inspired as little enthusiasm as it does today. And I'm not talking about the notoriously unchurched segments of our culture, growing though they are, but about Christians. As my wife Christine and I work with the emerging generation of Christians in Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Canada, and the United States, we are finding that they have at least one thing in common: a hunger for a church that is more than just someplace you "go to." While some North American congregations spend vast sums on expanding physical plants, their next generation is asking, "Is this all there is?"
These young people are unwilling to let modernity arrange most of the furniture of life, while faith is reduced to a trivial diversion on the edges. They don't want to compartmentalize their faith—even if it's a large, well-furnished compartment with an indoor swimming pool and a food court. They want a church that is actually connected to the rest of lives—or better yet, a church that actually shapes their lives.
In Oakland, California, one young group of believers has taken that seriously—enough to start a very different kind of building program.
In 1985 The United Methodist Church assigned the Rev. David McKeithen to Rockridge United Methodist Church, a congregation that had voted to disband because of declining membership in a changing neighborhood. Instead, McKeithen gradually drew a handful of new members who effectively planted a new church in the same building. Drawing much of their inspiration from Church of the Saviour in Washington, D.C., they gathered a new congregation dedicated to a common life that goes far beyond Sunday morning worship. Like Church of the Saviour ...
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