Saturday, February 05, 2005

What is disruptive theology

This idea arose from the concept of disruptive technology in the high teach arena

From: The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail
By Clayton M. Christensen
  • Disruptive technologies were technologically straightforward.
  • They captured huge market share in entirely new markets
  • The were almost uniquely created by new entrants into the market
  • Most of these companies began to pursue sustaining technology that led to their being surpassed and eclipsed by other new entrants with their disruptive technology. This happened by a focus on providing technological improvement for their current customer base
  • The new industry fueled by the new innovation eclipsed the previous technologies

    I see a similar process happening in the church. Recent membership gains in the evangelical wing of the church stand in stark contrast to liberal churches which by and large have continued a steady 50 year decline to the point that they are all but dead. Particularly interesting are innovative new church developments that target specific age groups such as 20-somethings. An example of this is a southern CA church (Mosaic) which has grown from 60 to 2000 in the past six years producing child congregations in a number of other cities. This is a highly multi-cultural congregation with an average age of 24.

I see problems across the entire theological spectrum of the American church.

  • American churches are highly focused on institutional survival needs, i.e. much attention paid to questions of how to pay for staff / buildings / programs for their own members. Correspondingly little money to needs outside the church. Churches brag about 10% of income going outside. Why not a church where 50% or more goes outside?. Perhaps 100% above a certain threshold!
  • American churches are BORING! Out of touch / irrelevant to today’s culture, using old dated rituals / music / forms
  • Many churches hurt and excludes people by being a proponent for American suburban culture
  • Many chcurches exhibit rigidity in Biblical interpretation. They are out of touch with modern knowledge about the world and academic knowledge about Bible. The ignore developments in anthropology, sociology, psychology, physics, chemistry... As a consequence they often actively foster ignorance about global problems, as well as about emerging science / technology issues.

I am looking to find a group of procgressive Christians willing to look outside of the box and envision a new "disruptive theology" approach to being a church.

Anyone out there?