Hang in there! – To our younger subscribers

Rodney Eivers, Chairperson, UCFORUM

19th February 2021

          The UC Forum website continues to draw subscribers from far and wide and it is refreshing to see that some of them recently are of a younger generation.

          One would expect to find doctrinal progressivism being the choice of young people having, as they do, lives of several decades ahead of them. The sad observation, though, is that it is the more mature folk who are drawn to this more open way of fitting religious faith to the 21st century environment. Indeed, to the extent that they are drawn to Christian faith, fundamentalism seems to win in the appeal to the young. An explanation of this contrast may be that thinking, older people, after a lifetime of seeking and expressing a Christian faith, are finding that the suppositions behind orthodoxy do not fit their experience and realities of the current intellectual age.

          But where do young seekers go to find and share experiences of their faith in something beyond orthodoxy?

          In Australia there are actually very few Uniting Churches (or other mainline denominations) which avowedly declare themselves as doctrinally wholly “progressive”. There may be only several in each Australian state or territory. Last week we featured one of them, the Woden Valley Uniting Church in the Australian Capital Territory. There are of course now many congregations that would describe themselves as liberal/inclusive/open and welcoming people who think critically about all they are told. These congregations have many progressive thinkers in them.

          What we do find, however, is that most congregations, perhaps the majority, have one or two individuals with a progressive orientation. Likewise, with the ministers of many congregations, Paul I and I have been surprised, when having a quiet private chat with many church leaders, at how many of them, in confidence, are receptive to progressive interpretations of Christian traditions and of, for instance, the UCA Basis of Union.

          On the right-hand panel of this website, you will find a long list of congregations being attended by our subscribers and these are only the ones we know about. Those congregations and their ministers would value your moral support. They do need to be wary of the guardians of orthodoxy in being too public but in many cases I expect you will find they will be helpful in finding you a niche.

          Perhaps if more young people come along and show their interest in promoting and following the Jesus way in a non-supernaturalist, non-theistic view of the world,       they will come to find warm companionship in many more of our churches.

oOo

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