One of the interesting things about the credit crunch is the idea, expressed by politicians and the media, that what we need is a return to normality. The normality they mean has lasted for a couple of decades at the most and the present crisis is a move to a new normality. The economy is correcting itself and when this happens it is always painful.
What we are experiencing is of course a change of paradigm. The problem is that we don't yet know what the new paradigm will be.
I expect sooner or later someone will tell me the approaches I recommend in this blog are secular in origin. My response to this is that many of the methods and approaches freely used in our society originated during past paradigm shifts and from the churches' reflection upon changes happening around them. Examples of the type of thing I mean include the growth in nineteenth century working class movements, the origins of community development and a great deal of management theory. I have already written about one of these and may write about the others at some future time.
The churches have as many problems with shifts in paradigm as everyone else. Our focus should not be on whether various methodologies are Christian or not; often when we look it is our own approaches that are returning to us, perhaps developed out of recognition by conversations with the secular world. Our focus should be upon our response to the next shift.
The problem is that when a shift in paradigm is needed it can be difficult to see a way forward whilst the mind is with the old paradigm. Churches may be well positioned to see beyond the old paradigm precisely because they cherish older traditions. It is different mindsets that are needed in times of change.
The focus of a range of traditions on the same problem may have great potential to bring about real change. It is time we as churches together attempt to do this, whether or not we think we've done it before. To those who think I should be writing about the need for a movement of the spirit; that is exactly what I'm saying. The spirit moves where it wills and so we should not close any door because we fear certain approaches are not Christian enough.
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