From Impasse to Passage - the evolution of Christianity practices and beliefs

Ecumenical Review, The, Jan, 2001 by Isabelle Graessle

   What consequences may we draw for the renewal of metaphors for the church?

      I would postulate that the image of passage, rooted biblically in these
   two founding elements, which portray routes taken collectively and
   individually, from death to life, constitutes without a doubt the
   metaphorical path to follow in learning to speak about the church.

      I would put forward, as a corollary thesis to that of a passage, the
   need for the church to open up to its identity insofar as that is already
   given, seeing that in the perspective of a realistic spirit of modesty.

The fourth place of passage has to do with the mission of the church. Though tradition sees mission as "proclaiming the Word of God to the world", Christian, or in any case Protestant, ecclesiology recognizes that in the context of a world which has become non-Christian we are obliged to reconsider the mission of the church. Between the understanding of mission as gathering all humanity into the people of God (the evangelical approach), and that of mission as cooperation in establishing a just and peaceful society, thus realizing the human ideal proposed by Christ (the political approach), the majority of Protestant churches choose the middle way of being an authentic and credible presence in the midst of this society.

For my part, I believe that -- the time for passage having come -- a middle-term solution can, unfortunately, no longer be tolerated. By giving priority to consensus, we cannot always succeed in holding together a bundle of elements which no doubt come from the tradition, but whose present validity one may be permitted to doubt. That the church does not mistake itself for Christ is well and good; but for the church to consider itself sanctified because it belongs to God, and to interpret its mission as proclaiming God's liberation to the world, remains for me highly problematic.

One of these elements is that Christianity is indeed beginning to question, albeit in a very tentative way, the uniqueness of God's revelation through it, and the continuation of that revelation within Christianity's institution, the church. A considerable role in such questioning has been played by more than a century of inter-religious dialogue, which only in recent decades has been a large-scale strategy. In this perspective, it no longer seems possible today to count on being able to convert the world to the tenets of the Christian faith. Theology is still discreetly talking about "witness". But one could propose that we pass over to another missiological register, notably that of tackling, in cooperation with the other religions, the elements of our existence which are senseless, shabby and scandalous negations of human dignity.

   What consequences may be drawn for the church and its mission?

      I would postulate that the mission of the church today is no longer
   defined by the will to bring about the religious conversion of that which
   is not (yet) its own. On the other hand, other notions could now be
   reintroduced into this empty paradigm, ranging from witness to
   denunciation, and including investment on behalf of others.

      I would put forward, as a corollary thesis to that of a passage, the
   need for the church to rethink its mission, no longer in terms of conquest,
   but in terms of openness.