Jesus Manifesto - Latest Comments in emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

timmer — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 15:33:24 -0000

Haha...evangelical literature. I heard Mark Driscoll talking about that. He found it ironic that the two best selling books/series in Christian lit have been Left Behind and the Prayer of Jabez. Basically, he said, "The two biggest things that conern us as evangelicals is--how do we get more stuff, and when do we get to leave?" Evidence that Christians have their priorities straight....

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

blorge — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 13:14:07 -0000

I think you're right, Timmer. I've long had an aversion to Contemporary Christian culture, and especially the literature that has been produced from the evangelical machine. Give me Dumas or Hemmingway over Peretti or Left Behind any day!

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

timmer — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 08:49:08 -0000

Kitsch is a great word for how art often works itself out in the church. I've seen this in the music realm especially. I refer to it as the "evangelical trickle-down arts problem." Now that's a book title! Evangelicals in general tend take the best of secular art culture and then boil it down until it is palatable for almost everyone. What is left is sort of a beige, useless mass (think suburb house!). This leaves the art with only a faint echo of what it once was, with little or no semblence of what made it great in the first place.

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

markvans — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 08:28:32 -0000

I was hoping someone would comment on that! I'm actually growing appreciative of many within emergent...but for so many the whole thing can be boiled down to a template. I suppose i could have just as easily written "Christianity?"

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

todd h — Sun, 12 Jun 2005 23:22:12 -0000

Great post! I loved the copyright on "emergent."

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

Trike — Sat, 11 Jun 2005 17:47:09 -0000

BTW - nice word, shite. Is that the Bethel way of spelling it?
ST

Re: emerge, but for Pete’s sake avoid the kitsch

Trike — Sat, 11 Jun 2005 17:45:59 -0000

Amen, and Amen, and Amen! I felt like I could have written this post myself - so therefore, I guess you were pretty inspired in writing it, eh? Or, did you do it after a few of Pat's homeaid beers.

Anyway, I too feel like one of the dangers of the emergent movement is a sense of actually being more FORMULA motivated than the boomers - especially when it comes to art, litergy, icons, etc. It seems like these things BECOME the reason the emergent is so "cool" - as opposed to being the MEANS to another end - being swept up into the glory of God. All the Authentic, Emergent, Inclusive, Incarnational, Missiological, Dialogical, Contextual and Ancient-Futural (new word, eh?) in the world doesn't mean squat if it is an idol! The MEANS have become the ENDS to make my point clearer.

Now, know this, I tend toward iconoclast as well - not because I am opposed to them, but because I can see how incredibly idolatrous our culture is with everything, especially religion.

Just one man's point of view. Thanks for the rich post.

Trike