“The Death of the Episcopal Church is near!” That was the headline of an article written by Professor Ryan E. Burge of Eastern Illinois University on July 6, 2021. Professor Burge, like many others, looked at the demographics of the Episcopal Church and the trend of systematic decline over the last two decades. The predictions are dire. With the average age of Episcopalians hovering in the mid- to late-sixties, prognosticators of all stripes and shades are predicting the demise of the Episcopal Church. The Episcopal Church is dying.
That’s the bad news.
The good news is that the church needs to die.
How is that good news, you may ask? Well, because we serve a God who is in the business of resurrection. God raises the dead. God is raising the dead. For us as a church to be raised to new life, for us as a church to find and rediscover ourselves and our purpose, we need resurrection. We need to rediscover, reimagine, and refine who we are and refocus on following the itinerant preacher named Jesus, who transformed the lives of those around him, not with miracles and feats of power, but by simply seeing, naming, and claiming the beloved people of God. As a church, as a denomination, we need to be stripped bare of all the accumulated distractions that have become idols. We need to let the many “isms” that have become part of the church die so that we can be fully the loving, liberating, and life-giving people that Jesus calls us to be.In short, the church needs to die. We need to go back to the basics of feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, giving water to the thirsty, seeing the left behind and left out, sharing the Good News.
Growing up in Barbados I spent almost every weekend of my childhood at the ocean. I loved the salt air, the symphony of the waves crashing against the shore, the warmth of the water. There is something mystical about standing at the edge of a vast expanse of water. The shore is a sacred place that often reminds me that God is ultimately and always in charge. I remember at one point swimming in the ocean and being caught in a riptide. In that moment of panic, as the current pulls you swiftly away from the shore, every fiber of your being begins to fight the current. I started swimming as hard as I could against the current. I got tired. I was afraid. And then a voice in my head, the voice of my swim teacher, whispered, “Let go.” To let go, to relax and be carried in the middle of a rip current goes against every instinct and yet the letting go is what saves you. When I relaxed and let go, the tide carried me out to sea and then tossed me back onto the shore further down the beach.
This time in the life of the church is a lot like being caught in a riptide. God is pointing the Episcopal Church to a new shore, to a new way of being, a new way of living, we simply have to let go. Let go of the things that we fear. Let go of resisting change. Let go of the way we have always done and been. God is calling the Episcopal Church towards resurrection. The challenge for the church is that we continue to fight against the tide, we continue to try to swim against the current of the Holy Spirit leading us towards new life.
As the church, as followers of Jesus Christ, we must find our new “why.” Why do we exist in this town, city, or neighborhood? Would our neighbors miss us if we disappeared tomorrow? What difference does it make that we gather for worship, sing hymns, offer prayers if we are not transforming the lives of our neighbors with the Good News we have discovered in Jesus?
We do not have time to argue about carpet and candlesticks, we must be about the business of sharing and showing the love of God to a world in desperate need of love. We can no longer committee the gospel imperative to serve others, we must step out of our buildings and our places of comfort and engage with our neighbors.
I am convinced that this is our time as the Episcopal Church. I am convinced that we have been called for precisely this moment. I am convinced that our branch of the Jesus Movement is needed now more than ever. With fear and division rampant in our nation, with the ravages of COVID-19 still being felt across the world, with the dual scourges of racism and homophobia continuing to infect our communities, God is pointing this church of ours towards a new shore, towards a new way of being, towards resurrection.
The death of the Episcopal Church is near! The new shore is in the distance. Resurrection is calling. Let go!