ECM as a NSM

I think Tony’s spot on here and as usual, is able to put to words something I have been feeling for some time as I read the recent influx of blog posts from people talking about how they’re now “beyond” emerging or and emerging is a dead meaningless label or how so many people are outgrowing the movement.

The EMC as an NSM « Tony Jones

One of the reasons that I think the movement at large (of which Emergent Village is a part) will not go away is that the Emergent/-ing Church Movement (ECM) is part of a much broader cultural reality in the West, what sociologists call New Social Movements.

be sure to read the whole post, it’s short.

I will say that I really don’t care personally what people think about the ECM or if they think they’re “beyond” it or whatever. But I will suggest that those people are probably not moving WITH the movement but rather are dipping their toes in the river at various points in order to participate when they want and criticize when they want. Or they’re getting hung up on a label instead of participating in something more than the label. They are likely people who are pretty entrenched in the way things have always been and are pretty happy there but like to dip their bucket into the ECM sometimes in order to get ideas to revitalize their current system. And that’s fine, truly it is, I’m not an Emergent evangelist, but the truth is that the ECM is a movement with many entry points, it’s a movement that is MOVING and if you are moving with it you will see many stages of maturity and growth and progression that you won’t see if you’re standing upstream a mile dipping your toe in.

Again, I really don’t care if people want to be a part of this movement or not - I believe that every Christian is a part of it in some way because we’re all in this current age within society whether we like it/know it or not. Sometimes I get the impression that people write things about emerging assuming that they’re going to piss off a bunch of people because they’re just “oh so provocative” - yeah, not so much. As Tony said in his post, it’s just not that important because the movement is either going to move on with the Spirit or it’s not, it’s not dependent on people yelling from the shore or on those who have jumped out and now like to spout off about what they perceive as “rightness” about their own journey.

…and that’s really all I have to say about that today

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