"The Church is the only institution that exists primarily for the benefit of those who are not its members.” – William Temple, former Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury
The church is the church only when it exists for others. —Dietrich Bonhoeffer
So much of the proselytizing aspect of the church believes it has ahold of some special gospel that will save others. Or it places itself in a paternalistic posture (especially moral in nature) that understands itself to possess something that others lack.
This is why I’ve felt exhausted by language of discipleship or spiritually leading people or all that other condescending bullshit.
It isn’t easy to discover a communal way of being in the world, a way of being an “organization” that moves in a mutual way, having an “identity” that is still an identify but entirely “for others.”
It is a risky way, living day to day with the possibility of dissolution, open to the possibility that anything posessed may need to be given back, offered for reparation. The church in America is so ensconced in systems of power and wealth all the ways we measure thriving insist on the church operating by keeping, gathering, hoarding, for itself.
I find it to be the case that although it is deeply satisfying to pastor in the church from the perspective that we are entirely “for others,” being willing to fall down, fail, etc all in order to live our core mission, it is nevertheless a very tenuous thing: maintaining the institution all the while realizing the institution maintains itself best by not maintaining itself.
However, what I discover is that when we exist for others we also find ourselves in others. Atheist neighbors may become the best evangelists for the church; the community may know more about the mission of the church than its members; it may even be we become strangers to ourselves and in that way discover who we are.
This is precisely the most radical situation: it is most likely we all ask ourselves, What can the church do for me? What does it owe me? Good music? A youth program? Spiritual renewal? But what if that sense of the church owing us something is an aspect of our self-alienation?
Christianity has long understood itself as cruciform, grounded in the cross of Christ. I think this is what this looks like, but Lord have mercy is it a lot of work and practice to extract church practice from the grip of alternative construals based in glory.
The way your argument works is by minimizing the many works that churches work. Do your really think a matriarchal structure would work better? I would be glad to know of historic examples where this was the case. I see the situation a lot more complex and nuanced than what you presented. It feels like you are throwing stuff out to get a response rather than unpacking possible solutions to the situations that you have presented. I must say that this statement of yours is particularly self- evident. "This is why I’ve felt exhausted by language of discipleship or spiritually leading people or all that other condescending bullshit." I had a coworker who had a saying that is apropos; "If you are pointing a finger at me, you have four pointing back at you"