A church big enough for us all

Yesterday on the long drive back from Louisiana, I got to thinking again about Ricky Sinclair, the guy I grew up with back in St. Francisville, who got into serious trouble with the law (drug smuggling, a prison break), had a profound jailhouse conversion, and is now an evangelist running a successful ministry. Mind you, I don't know Ricky, and didn't know him back then, except as a kid a few years older than me who was a badass on the baseball field, and who had a rough life at home (the word among us kids was that his late father used to tie him and his brother Chris to the back of his pick-up truck, and drive across pastures with the boys running behind -- the idea being to toughen the boys up athletically). Ricky reports that when he got thrown into jail a second time, one of the lawmen from whom he was running confronted him, told him he needed Christ in his life, and set into motion a series of events that led to Ricky's conversion, repentance, and to his making something of himself as a zealous nondenominational/charismatic evangelist preaching to a multiracial congregation.

I was thinking on the way home yesterday how much sense it makes that inmate Ricky was reached by a Pentecostal. To be sure, I don't know that the man who witnessed to him was a Pentecostal, but from what I know of my hometown, if he was a Christian working as a jailer, chances are great that he was a Pentecostal of some sort, or at least an Evangelical. I'm generalizing, of course, but where I'm from, the religion of the working class and the poor is Pentecostalism -- and I use the term broadly to mean charismatic, non-denominational Christianity in the Protestant tradition. It's not that only the poor and working classes are drawn to Pentecostalism, but rather that if you are poor or in the working class, and you go to church, chances are the church you go to is Pentecostal, or at least Evangelical.

I was thinking about how unlikely it would be that Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Presbyterianism or other forms of the Christian faith that attract the middle-class intellectuals I know would appeal to the Ricky Sinclairs of the world. This is a complicated topic, and I don't have any conclusions to offer, so I'm just going to throw out my own thoughts, and invite yours. There is a spiritual depth and intellectual complexity to these forms of Christianity that appeals to middle-class intellectuals who have grown weary with the emotionalism and trendiness of much popular religion. On the other hand, I've thought for years as a Catholic, and still think as an Orthodox, how hard it would be for a working man who was broken and who needed Jesus to walk in off the street and find him at one of our churches. Oh, Jesus is there, make no mistake -- but he's a lot harder to find than at one of the charismatic churches.

Is that always a bad thing? No. I've been worshiping with the Orthodox for almost two years now, and I'm just now getting the rhythm of the Divine Liturgy. Aspects of Orthodoxy that seemed opaque to me at first are now starting to open up. Someone who just walked in expecting to understand it all on one visit couldn't help but be disappointed, and lost amid all the liturgics, the clouds of incense, the ritual. Can't speak for Calvinism, of which I have no experience, but Catholicism is more or less the same, and anyway, the Calvinists I know are very serious and well-informed about doctrine. All of this is as it should be, to a certain point. I would not have the Orthodox Church compromise on its ancient liturgy, for example, for the sake of making it possible for just anybody to walk off the street and feel right at home, with no effort at all.

Along those lines, Catholicism and Orthodoxy both have been the traditional religion of tens of millions of the world's poor, and still are. The question that I thought about yesterday, then, is probably primarily one concerning North American middle-class white people. And yet, the charismatic and Evangelical churches are having tremendous success in Latin America, winning converts from historic Catholicism. I've heard too many stories about lives being changed for the better from these conversions to dismiss them. I would expect a similar dynamic to emerge in the Orthodox lands soon, if it hasn't already, and I would have the same feeling about it then as I did as a Catholic: while I dislike what's happening, attempting to use the laws to suppress the Protestant evangelists are doomed, because for whatever reason, that form of Christianity it speaking to people's needs in ways that our form(s) is (are) not. The challenge must be met, not ignored, disdained or deflected.

Why? I ask as a sociological question, not a theological question. What is it about our time that makes the heavy old forms of Christianity -- Orthodoxy and Catholicism -- so apparently ill-suited to compete with the amorphous Pentecostalism that's sweeping the poor? Is it the case that the very complexity and depth that appeals to middle-class North American intellectuals makes the faith relatively inaccessible to the masses? Is it the case that we live now in a demotic age, in which any institution that depends on hierarchies and traditional authority will struggle for the hearts of the common man? That is, in the past it would have been understood that the Thing That We All Do is worship at the Catholic/Orthodox parish, whether we remain as beginners in faith, or have plumbed the theological depths of the Tradition, because That Is What We Do -- but today, there is an unregulated free market in faith, and we are free to choose.

Is it the case that the more demotic forms of Protestant Christianity preach a gospel that, however twisted in some of its manifestations (e.g., the prosperity gospel), nevertheless holds out to suffering people the hope that their lives can change for the better -- whereas the older, more traditional forms of Christianity are more accepting of suffering as part of the human condition, to a degree that tips over into fatalism?

One of the things I admire so much about Catholicism is its depth and its breadth. It has room for all kinds of spiritual approaches, and popular piety as well as high theological rumination. (Perhaps this is true of Orthodoxy also; I don't really know). I liked that I could go to mass on Sunday, and could share a pew with people from all walks of life, sociologically speaking. But in our country, I do wonder if the poor (excluding the immigrant poor from Latin America) have any entry point into Catholicism or Orthodoxy. And why that is. And how it should change within the tradition, because it's impossible to imagine a Christian church that has no room for the poor and working classes. And: why does it seem that the Christians who sound most concerned about the welfare of the poor and working classes are those least likely to share their instinct toward traditional sexual morality? It's undoubtedly true that many of the traditional churches have ministries to help meet the material needs of the poor. But how many of the poor are becoming Catholic, Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Orthodox, etc., because of them? Are these churches places where the poor could see themselves becoming a part of the congregation, or are the poor more likely to see them as vendors of charity, but only that? And if the latter, who's to blame, and why?

Given the options available on the American religious market, is it possible for classic Catholicism and Orthodoxy to compete with storefront Pentecostalism and megachurch Evangelicalism? If not, what does this tell us about the future of Catholicism in North America, and the future of Orthodoxy?

In sports, the rule is that unless a sport attracts working-class interest, it's doomed to be a minor pursuit (e.g., soccer, tennis), and not capture the heart of the culture (e.g., baseball, basketball, football). Is the same true with churches? Are the sons of the working classes even bothering to be priests anymore in the old churches? If not, why not? Because I tell you, whatever else you might say about "Bishop" Ricky's church, that man has lived a rough life, and personally identifies with the struggles of the poor and the working class. He has credibility. Previous generations of priests in the Catholic and Orthodox churches, when they were primarily immigrant churches, would have had the same kind of credibility, but do they now?

I don't know. Like I said, I've got no conclusions. But I do have questions. Thoughts? It might help to ask, "If a poor or working-class family walked into the door of my church this Sunday, would they be likely to return? Why or why not?"