Reuters reports (Wed. 10 Feb 10) that the Synod of the Church of England criticised broadcasters – the BBC in particular – for the steep reduction in “religious broadcasting”. Claiming that this actively marginalises religion and treats religious programming as “freak shows”.

I’m sitting here thinking about the report and a few things come to mind about this. First – what qualifies as “religious” programming? Is it historical/documentary? Is it an exploration of current theological trends? Is it a balanced presentation of the positions on a current issue from the perspective of different traditions? Or, is “religious” programming praise, preaching, and televised services?

I think it is very difficult to get the shape of a program right in both categories. The BBC recently offered Diarmaid MacCulloch’s excellent History of Christianity. But much of the “documentary” programming on historical and current religious issues falls into the realm of thoughtless agenda pushing, or mind-numbing “lets stick to the script” surveys. Both extremes neither inform, nor encourage deeper interest and exploration. Then we have the worship/service category – and the “flagship” show for this here in England is “Songs of Praise”. I don’t know about you but from the perspective of one in the sacramental/liturgical tradition this sort of programming . . . is simply awkward. When I lived in the States there were often channels that televised the Liturgy once a week. “Watching” the Liturgy is not the same as “participating” in the Liturgy – it becomes an anthropological exercise rather than a participatory experience. I think if I were a non-liturgical Protestant, it would be less awkward because preaching, prayer, and praise can easily be done regardless of the environment (though I suspect if that’s your devotional bent – it is still more comfortable to be in the presence of others, sharing the experience).

Aside from the occasional well designed documentary, or exploration of a particular topic within a given tradition, or among various traditions – religious programming is awkward. It seems to me that part of this freakishness is as much about context as it is about content. Simply televising a worship service, or liturgy is not good religious programming because it takes that “experience” out of its natural context and plops it in the viewer’s lap. Something else, something more tailored to the media is needed – and that almost never happens. Even Songs of Praise – which clearly makes an effort to do this – does not quite make it.

Something like 50% of internet users connect to their faith tradition on the web. Because the net is relatively “novel” individuals and communities putting the good material up are tailoring the shape and substance of their presentation to better fit the medium of the internet. The benefit of this avenue of presentation of course is that the material can be produced for different audiences, within the spectrum of a tradition, and not be pigeon-holed to suit the lowest common denominator so as to attempt to “make good TV”. The medium throws open the doors to better quality material, more in-depth exploration, and the possibility of graduating from the mere bullet points of an issue to a developed presentation of the finer points; allowing the viewer to stop and start as needed.

I’m listening to the newest edition of the ISM Network, a project of Mother Cait in Pennsylvania – another example of neat projects by indie folk – very cool. Over the past two weeks I’ve been listening snips of various episodes – the variety of topics and the thoughfulness of the participants has really been a joy.

If I’m reading the specs correctly – Mo. Cait puts out an edition once a week at 11pm Eastern Time – if you are out of that time zone, or not a night owl, each episode is archived so you can listen at your convenience.

We have been exploring the use of the net, and technology generally in an OC/IC context here for over a year now. But one thing that has not yet been mentioned (I think) is the idea of “media literacy” in OC/IC projects. This article by the Utne Reader – brings that idea crashing home.

The article highlights the issue of critical analysis of what we see on the web. How information is presented, and how we sift through it, assessing the veracity of that information, its accuracy, and its agenda. I suspect that when most of us were younger we were taught how to do this with “traditional” media sources – books, newspapers, magazines, journals, and film and television. But the nature of media has changed rapidly, and dramatically over the past decade – does this not also mean that the way in which we assess these sources must also change?

To my mind this is a topical issue on two fronts. Firstly – how we OC/IC folk using the net, assess those sources related to theology, history, spirituality, and religious news. How is that process affecting how we use the information both online and in our communities? Secondly – and I think I find this more important based on things we’ve been exploring here – how are we presenting our information online? Are we facilitating a sense of good critical analysis of who and what we are? Are we pointing to balanced source material? Are we presenting our message in such a way that the information-saavy will not simply click through, snorting “Quacks” as they do?

How can we help one another to make the web more of a tool and less of a novelty, or “basic” necessity in our various projects? One way might be to be helpful to one another. A bit of “peer review” amongst friends can make those seemingly minor changes that have a big impact in how our sites and vids are recieved, found, and commented upon.

We’ve often talked about the ideas and images of what constitutes “church” many converts to the indie life inherit or bring with them into the community. Tim Cravens has just posted a reflection on one aspect of this – the sense of embarrassment many indie clergy feel over not having our own buildings, salaried clergy and so on. Tim makes a good point that we need to not allow ourselves and our fellow ministers to become overwhelmed by this to the point that it inhibits our ability to be ministers in the here and now.

I tink part of the solution is to cultivate within each one of us, and within our communities, a confidence in our identity as OC/IC believers – or as I’ve said here before – we are not second class or second rate christians – we “are” the real thing.

One of Tim’s commentors pointed out, and I agree with her whole heartedly, is that there is a real need for cooperation, collaboration, and through that the cultivation of mutual support (i.e. confidence) within our movement. John Plummer’s phrase “we all need friends” in relation to relations within the OC/IC community are equally applicable here.

But that “friendship” must be deeper than merely, clicking the “lets be friends” button on our Facebook profiles – never to utter “Boo!” to one another again. Friendship – true frienship is deeper, and requires openness, and cultivation – it lifts us up out of the isolation we can sometimes feel within our smaller OC/IC jurisdictions, scattered as we are in the “Diaspora”.

Through frienship we can dissolve the barriers of suspicion and mistrust from within the community as a whole. Through frienship we can collaborate, and share, without the compulsion to create “larger” artificial organisational structures (every one of which that I’m aware of over the past 20 years of active OC/IC life has failed – with a body count!). Through frienship we might see an organic improvement in the quality of our communities, and the individuals chosen to serve and lead them (both lay and ordained). If for example, my friend Bishop X won’t ordain you – why the hell should I? If I trust Bishop X, if he/she is my friend – it would be disrespectful to undermine his/her judgement because he/she is my friend, and a fellow bishop.

But lets get back to Tim’s post – and his point that indie clergy are nearly always working in the world – holding down a job, running a household, having a life, and on top of that – doing ministry. Through friendship – through real collaboration – we can build a solid netowrk of mutual support to encourage, bring relief to, and cultivate confidence for our fellow ministers in the movement. Making the vocation of a “worker priest” (or worker bishop) that much more enriching both for the minister, and those he or she serves.

Through frienship we can radically change the dynamic of the way our OC/IC movement has dys-functioned over the past 75 years. And all it takes is a bit of openness, and a willingness to collaborate.

I read with interest this article by Dr. Murdo MacDonald Policy Officer for the Society, Religion and Technology Project for the Church of Scotland on that church’s stance on stem cell research. I then started asking about how this, and issues like it, are being explored in OC/IC communities. However, I have as yet, seen no discussion of stem cell research and similar issues in other OC/IC places (other than here) – have you?

Come to think about it – I cannot recall seeing many (read “any”) discussions of the interplay of science and religion, contemporary ethics, and similar contemporary issues in OC/IC settings – can you?

This leads me to ask: why? Why is it that in our forums issues gravitate towards the same, predictable, limited set: ordination of women, same sex marriage, ordination of LGBT, ritualism, and oh, lets not forget – the all holy “puppy pedigree” monster? Are we that . . . . intellectually, and spiritually “stunted” that we are incapable of intelligent discussion on other, more pressing, indeed more interesting matters?

I know based on knowing the backgrounds of many OC/IC folk, that we have a large cadre of highly intelligent, thoughtful, interesting, well educated people in the movement today – so why are we not enjoying the benefit of their insight, research, and expression of OC/IC ideas on a larger scale than a few clandestine phone calls, or quiet emails passed under the table?

What is interesting to me is the realisation that this narrow “set” of regularly regurgitated issues has a direct effect on how our members perceive this tradition, and how outsiders see us. Don’t you think it is time we make a concerted effort to speak to a wider audience, to cultivate voices of faith, thoughtful, and engaged with issues that matter? What are you, and your local OC/IC community doing to bring about a broader, more in-depth conversation about the OC/IC praxis of today (rather than that of a century ago)?

The Irish politician Feargal Quinn has written in the Irish Times (27 March) that the EU must set a fixed date for Pascha. His argument runs that the movable date is inconvenient to parents and schools organising vacations, and time off. That it negatively affects the tourist industry, and causes inefficiency in other businesses attempting to market their Easter related products. The current system, asserts the Senator, is considered by many to be a hassle and needs to be fixed. The EU he points out is great at unifying and systematising things – so why not the date of Easter? Afterall, it would, he believes, be enormously popular since we all find the movable date of Easter so irritating.

First lets deal with the most obvious issue. As part of Quinn’s argument he attacks the Orthodox for, as he says, being the ones preventing the adoption of the WCC proposed unified date of Easter (never mind the fact that it would still be a moveable feast!). If the EU were to undertake the project, it is unlikely that the rest of the world will follow suit. Think about this for a minute, we need only look at developments in the Anglican communion over the past ten years to see that Nigeria and her sister churches would see this as yet another decadent, heterodox intrusion by the liberal homosexuals in Brussels. Now – we have three, no, four dates of Easter. I can imagine any number of churches in the US that would follow suit.

There’s another problem here too and that is – if the EU, a secular authority is to set the calculations for one religious festival, then for the sake of consistency, and fairness – it must set them all. So, what do you think of the new European wide Pascha-Ramada-Pesach? It would be efficient – Muslims, Christians and Jews would celebrate their major feast on the same day, making it easier for the tourism industry, soccer mom, and oh, of course lets not forget the all important businessman trying to make a living by hawking tawdry holiday crap at a time convenient for him.

Yeah, there’s a reason why it’s a religious festival and not a secular one. Our calendar is messy – true. But it’s got character, and history, and it makes the liturgical year have a sense of organic rhythm that it would most surely lose if we started pegging our movable feasts down – not for reasons of discernment, and good praxis but for “convenience”.

I’m all for a unified date of Pascha – it is, interestingly enough, the only festival that that ancient canons specifically state must be celebrated by the whole church on the same day. Other feasts have regional variations even now. But, it also took over 300 years to arrive at the decision for a unified date of Easter.

My own community, until recently, struggled with the problem of the two Pascha’s for over a decade – because we had both Eastern and Western rite communities and missions. Every year we would raise the spectre of debating the date, and every year we had to set it aside because neither side was happy to abandon its “traditional” date – and it must be said for some very interesting, and very well thought out reasons.

I raise this point not only to place this firmly within an OC/IC context, but to make the point that it is not a theological, or even a traditional reason that we should be concerned about a unified date of Pascha – but an ekklesiological one: that on this one day the whole Christian world confess “with one heart and one mind” our trust in the risen Christ, and to celebrate together our liberation from the fear of the dark places through which we must sometimes walk alone. Every year in our community as Great Lent arrived the old divisions between the two sides of the community emerged, and one side tried to push forward its own date. Every year we were reminded of how fragile a union we shared, and how, dis-unified in some respects we truly were as a “community”. Pascha is about our union with Christ, as much as it ought to be about our reaffermation to be in union with one another as community – locally, within our individual parishes and synods. If we can do that – then I’d venture to guess that we could learn to become a stronger “community” across the OC/IC movement.

Back in the 90’s there was a marked shift in religious life and thinking in the US. This lead many in the indie movement to speculate that this would bring more members into OC/IC communities. But did it – really? My experience was that it really made no difference at all – but perhaps this was due to the nature of where I was (DC) and the demographics of the people who came to our local parish.

The other question of course was did we really want disaffected Episcopalians, and Roman Catholics swelling the ranks of OC/IC communities? Again, experience suggests, that no, we did not, largely because we were not, at that time, strong enough in our own self identification to be able to not be overwhelmed by the psychological and spiritual baggage that this group presents when shifting denominational allegiance.

Over the past three weeks there have been a number of articles and studies released suggesting that religious belief, and denominational loyalty have suffered over the past decade in the US. I live in the UK where there is almost no Christianity to speak of – and what there is, is increasingly frightening in its radicalism and narrow mindedness. A number of articles have been even more “apocalyptic” speculating that within the next decade we will see the collapse of evangelical/protestant Christianity in the US, and an acceleration of splintering and radicalisation of the remnants of the faith there.

Not wanting to sound like the circling vultures I’m sitting here wondering how this might affect our communities? There is a suggestion in these studies, and earlier ones that the indie movement is seeing an upsurge of growth over the past ten years. A quick survey of the indie presence in my old stomping grounds in the states, while un-scientific to be sure, suggests this is true. There is also an increased probability of negative affects – just as in the shift observed 10 years ago, we might be overcome by issues and identifications of “other” traditions, which are incompatible with our own. Are we ready; are we stronger now in our sense of self-identification and “worth” than we were a decade ago? If not – what can we do collaboratively now, to lay the foundations for a better future?

There has been a small flood of articles on “conversion” in today’s religious news round-up. The two that caught my eye are a BBC report (here) on the Church of England’s consideration of a motion re-emphasising its explicit aim of converting people to Christianity; and Andrew Brown’s post (here on Guardian CIFBelief) reflecting on “evangelisation” in relation to the CofE motion. In his post Brown makes a rather thought-provoking observation:

In practice, though, conversion is hardly ever about intellectual conviction, whether it is to or away from Christianity, though it does seem to be more often intellectual when it is to atheism. But it is overwhelmingly about joining a tribe or a people and about shifting affections and allegiances rather than ideas. Conversion to Christianity or to Islam results when people find a tribe or a family they want to belong to; and it is worth noticing that the kinds of religions that concentrate most on conversion also simplify their doctrines as much as possible.

I love this quote, from an Imam interviewed for the BBC piece: “Any religion that believes it’s going to bring tangible benefits – peace, satisfaction and understanding in this life and the next – would like to share that.” Yes absolutely.

What I find curious though is that in our OC/IC context you don’t often see a discussion of outreach outside of the internal conversation of the local community – why? Could it be that all pervasive sense of isolation many congregations and projects feel? Maybe it is grounded in the thick layers of mistrust that have accumulated within the movement over the past few decades? Perhaps it is because so many of our “members” are ashamed or embarrassed about their links to the movement – “let’s just keep this quiet, amongst ourselves shall we”?

Let me throw open the door here and ask – what does your local community do to introduce people to the idea of OC/IC community? What challenges have you encountered? What did you do to overcome them (or better – which ones would you like some ideas on)?

Last week Lyngine commented: “I’m leaning towards the idea that it may hinge on teaching/helping individual clergy and laity to cultivate a strong, grounded spiritual life and how to sustain that as an OC/IC priest or lay person in the midst of isolation—ministry then flows from that—-if the strong spiritual/religious grounding isn’t there or can’t be sustained, then the rest of it falls apart anyway.”

Cultivating a living grounded spiritual life is, I agree an essential element of stability. I think it falls into that category of “this is what we do as a sacramental community” (emphasis on community). There are some elements of this that are I think worth unpacking – the phrase is deceptively short and simple. What is the spiritual life? What does it do? What does it express about our theology? How does it influence our praxis?

Where this gets really interesting is when we begin reflecting on the inherited language, images, and practices we bring to our new life in an OC/IC community. How often do we individually and collectively sit and ask: is this practice, custom, point of theology, a living example of an OC/IC ethos – or do we do it/keep it because it is “known” and “comfortable”?

I’m not suggesting that we re-invent the wheel here. What I am suggesting is that we are happily free to keep those ideas and practices that cultivate our living spirituality and nurture our identity as OC/IC folk, while leaving the baggage, dead weights, and plain nutty rubbish outside. Indeed, sometimes, it is necessary to pick up a broom and sweep away these things.

The caveat of course is that this process of pruning can only be effective in the context of a well informed, connected community. Too often it seems to me, this essential element is missing – so what ought to be an exercise in cultivating positive results, actually leads to strife, and dissolution.

A solution would be to, as a collective effort, cultivate scholarship, and to draw upon those resources in the local, and wider OC/IC community. This again is another step towards breaking down that terrible wall of isolation many communities, and individuals feel and observe.

We’ve talked about the “numbers game” in relation to notions of “success” in ministry (here). There is however, another branch of this “game” which we often bemoan, and joke about behind the closed doors in OC/IC circles; but rarely, constructively, in the open. For lack of a better term I’ll call this “High-speed Zapping”.

High-speed Zapping is giving offices and orders to incomers or participants who have literally just walked in the door. They have not been chrismated. They have had neither the time, nor the opportunity to discern whether this community is the one with which they will “throw in their lot” and live the spiritual life. They have not had the opportunity to invest in the community, neither has the community had time to invest in them. In short, their suitability for such offices, indeed for life in an indie community has not been intelligently assessed. The consequences of High-speed Zapping are known to all. We have, all of us, either seen it in our own communities, or have helped to pick up the pieces, and heal individuals and communities that have been caught up in it.

If we sit and honestly assess the situation I think we are all painfully aware of the root causes; in addition to the pull of the other branch of the numbers game (false sense of success), we face the challenges of ego, empire building, and a lack of authentic leadership. But what can serious OC/IC believers do to make a positive change in this situation?

To be sure I don’t have the answers. I can describe what my tiny community has formulated as its rule over the past 15 years of debate, experience, and observation of other communities. One is chrismated after a year as a participant (can.2.3a). You may not hold office, you may not vote, until you have converted and are chrismated. Members are not eligible for ordination before one full year after their chrismation (can. 8.3e); there must be a need within the community for a new ordinand (can. 8.b,c,m), and the community must approve the ordination (can. 8.3). Don’t even think about a mitre! You have to be a lay or ordained member for at least five years (can. 8.6c), the community elects new bishops (can. 7.8); and there must be a real need for a new bishop (can. 8.1n).*

This is but one model answering the problem in one community, how can we address it as a group of fellow indie believers seeking to improve our lot? A symptom (or consequence?) of High-speed Zapping is Synod Hopping (I really need to start an OC/IC dictionary!), where individuals, in order to acquire the orders and titles that they want for their own personal purposes, jump from one bishop to another, leaving a wake of hurt and destruction behind them.

Here again is where I think a working theory of friendship and collaboration comes into its own. If I enjoy a friendship with Bishop X and his/her community, and an individual from that community starts Synod Hopping and comes to me for say – a mitre because she is not going to get her way with Bishop X; out of respect for my friends, and in solidarity with another faithful OC/IC community that I trust, I’ll refuse and send her back to her community. It’s that simple. There is no formal organisation here, just a simple convention, and act of respect for my friends.

I suspect that if enough solid friendships are built, and acted upon, that the problem of high-speed zapping, and synod hopping would quickly wane.

*[For those interested you can acquire a complete copy of our canons here.]