It is Not Good

 When reading about the creation of the universe in Genesis, its interesting to note that, as God finishes each stage of creation, we are told "God saw that it was good."  That is the repeated theme of the entire first chapter.  So, when do things stop being good? Well, that doesn't happen until most of the way through the second chapter.  The first thing that isn't good, is for man to be alone.

I'm not saying anything original here, just borrowing from various Orthodox teachers, but this is the first point in Scripture where we are given a hint that salvation may not be an individual thing.  The reason I bring this up is a blog post brought to my attention by 9.West.  The blogger in question got a lot of coverage for these posts in various venues.  One thing that struck me was much of what he doesn't like about modern evangelicalism is summed up in the following points:

"2. We Evangelicals have failed to pass on to our young people an orthodox form of faith that can take root and survive the secular onslaught. Ironically, the billions of dollars we've spent on youth ministers, Christian music, publishing, and media has produced a culture of young Christians who know next to nothing about their own faith except how they feel about it. Our young people have deep beliefs about the culture war, but do not know why they should obey scripture, the essentials of theology, or the experience of spiritual discipline and community. Coming generations of Christians are going to be monumentally ignorant and unprepared for culture-wide pressures."

This reflects, I think, the radically individualistic nature of Evangelicalism.  Although Lutherans will be quick to point out that Luther very much believed that the Christian belonged in a worshipping community under the guidance of a pastor, what Luther did was establish that the individual could, in fact, work out what Scripture said all on his own.  After all, that is precisely what Luther did.  This individualism grew over Luther's lifetime such that even he decried the presence of so many factions.  Over the centuries this individualism has resulted in modern Evangelicalism.  Every individual has the right and capacity to figure out Christianity on their own.

In order, then, to draw the average Christian, a church must market itself.  It must present Christianity as a commodity where their particular brand is more attractive than another.  Music that is hard to tell apart from modern punk/rock/whatever, slick multimedia, promises of health and wealth, even the charismatic promise of an individual spiritual experience, all are necessary to draw people in.  Doctrine must necessarily fall by the wayside as it tends to challenge folks and demand that they change.  Sometimes that is appealing to folks, but this is a culture where pre-packaged peanut butter sandwiches can actually sell.  The work free option is always preferred.

Ancient Christianity, on the other hand, realizes that becoming a Christian is about coming into communion, both with God, and with their fellow Christians.  While the person is highly thought of, the individual has no place.  It is not good for man to be alone.  Protestant make up your own spirituality has no place.  The modern Evangelical Church and the collapse of mainline Protestantism is simply the fruit of a fundamentally flawed theology in which the individual has been made supreme.