Digital Commons @ George Fox University Doctor of Ministry Seminary 1-1-2013 Re-placing the church: missional opportunities in the emerging energy crisis Brandon D. Rhodes George Fox University This research is a product of the Doctor of Ministry (DMin) program at George Fox University. Find out more about the program. Recommended Citation Rhodes, Brandon D., "Re-placing the church: missional opportunities in the emerging energy crisis" (2013). Doctor of Ministry. Paper 57. http://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/dmin/57 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Seminary at Digital Commons @ George Fox University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctor of Ministry by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ George Fox University. RE-PLACING THE CHURCH: MISSIONAL OPPORTUNITIES IN THE EMERGING ENERGY CRISIS GEORGE FOX EVANGELICAL SEMINARY PORTLAND, OREGON FACULTY ADVISOR: DR. DWIGHT J. FRIESEN EXPERT ADVISOR: DR. DAN LIOY JANUARY 7, 2013 BRANDON D. RHODES George Fox Evangelical Seminary George Fox University Portland, Oregon CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL ________________________________ DMin Dissertation ________________________________ This is to certify that the DMin Dissertation of Brandon D. Rhodes has been approved by the Dissertation Committee on March 12, 2013 for the degree of Doctor of Ministry in Semiotics and Future Studies. Dissertation Committee: Primary Advisor: Dwight Friesen, DMin Secondary Advisor: Daniel Brunner, DPhil Lead Mentor: Leonard I. Sweet, PhD Expert Advisor: Daniel Lioy, PhD Copyright © 2013 Brandon Rhodes ii CONTENTS List of Figures, Tables, & Illustrations............................................................ vi Glossary ............................................................................................................vii Abstract .............................................................................................................xi SECTION 1: THE PROBLEM ............................................................................1 1.1 Focusing the Inquiry .................................................................................1 1.1.1. Beginning a conversation, not ending one ..................................1 1.1.2 The road ahead .............................................................................2 1.2 Suburbia, Consumerism, & Automobility Go Together ........................4 1.3 Automobility’s Historical Legacy for Society .........................................10 1.3.1 Why America adopted the car ......................................................10 1.3.2 Human-scaled life ........................................................................13 1.3.3 Automobility emerges ..................................................................14 1.3.4 Oil becomes useful .......................................................................16 1.3.5 A magical and revolutionary product ...........................................17 1.3.6 Suburbia emerging........................................................................ 20 1.3.7 Stuck in the gridlock of automobility ..........................................27 1.4 Automobility’s Historical Legacy in the American Church ..................28 1.4.1 Mapping the silence .....................................................................28 1.4.2 1870’s to 1960: Church in crisis and flux..................................... 32 1.4.3 Mainline comity........................................................................... 39 1.4.4 Evangelical invasion ....................................................................42 1.4.5 Changing Tides: Freedom of choice in religion ...........................43 1.4.6 Consumerism helps churches adapt to suburbia ..........................46 1.4.7 Refrain: Pick your Sunday........................................................... 50 1.4.8 Big-box Christianity? ...................................................................51 iii 1.4.9 Automobilized diaspora of the ministries ....................................56 1.4.10 Other shifts................................................................................. 59 1.5 Testing the Argument So Far ...................................................................62 1.5.1 The Blind Men .............................................................................63 1.5.2 The Elephant ................................................................................78 1.6 The Problem in Our Past: We’ve Told Our Story Poorly...................... 83 1.7 The Limits of Automobility’s Scope in History ......................................88 1.7.1 Oil from the rock.......................................................................... 88 1.7.2 Not all oil is alike .........................................................................90 1.7.3 Oil production’s total lifespan...................................................... 92 1.7.4 Estimates & eventualities .............................................................98 1.7.5 Economic demand, geopolitics, and other uncertainties ..............99 1.8 The Problem in Our Future: An Un(der)charted Tomorrow................ 101 SECTION 2: OTHER PROPOSED RESPONSES & MITIGATIONS ..........103 2.1 Preparatory Reflections............................................................................ 103 2.1.1 Solutions vs. responses ................................................................103 2.1.2 Guiding principles for Section 2 ..................................................104 2.2 Proposed Cultural Trajectories & Mitigations....................................... 105 2.2.1 Techno-progress & silver bullets .................................................106 2.2.2 Greenurbia.................................................................................... 114 2.2.3 Collapse, doom, survivalism ........................................................116 2.2.4 Transition Towns.......................................................................... 119 2.3 Proposed Church Trajectories .................................................................121 2.3.1 TGIF (Twitter, Google, iPhone, Facebook) .................................122 2.3.2 Peak Church .................................................................................124 2.3.3 The Great Emergence / Great Awakening ....................................126 2.3.4 Our future’s blind spot .................................................................128 2.4 Proposed Church Mitigations ..................................................................129 2.4.1 Virtual Church ..............................................................................130 2.4.2 Broadcast/Multisite/Satellite Church ...........................................131 2.4.3 Missional: Colonial Edition .........................................................133 iv 2.4.4 Missional: Parish Edition .............................................................135 SECTION 3: THESIS........................................................................................... 138 3.1 Full-Court-Press Conversation ................................................................138 3.2 The Conversation’s Conjectures.............................................................. 140 3.2.1 Everything will relocalize ............................................................140 3.2.2 Church will relocalize ..................................................................143 3.2.3 Pastoral priorities .........................................................................146 3.3 The Conversation’s Contours ..................................................................148 3.4 Cautions for the Conversation .................................................................151 SECTION 4: ARTIFACT DESCRIPTION ........................................................153 SECTION 5: TRACK 02 ARTIFACT SPECIFICATION ................................155 5.1 Artifact Considerations, Standards of Publication, and Action Plan... 155 5.2 Book Proposal............................................................................................ 155 SECTION 6: POSTSCRIPT ................................................................................166 6.1 Execution ...................................................................................................166 6.2 Efficacy....................................................................................................... 167 6.3 Concluding Thoughts, Lessons, and Trajectories ..................................168 APPENDIX A: SAMPLE MANUSCRIPT CHAPTERS................................ 170 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................. 171 v List of Figures, Tables, & Illustrations Figure 1: Automobility, Suburbia, and Consumerism Go Together 6 Figure 2: Defend/Agitate, React Against/Adapt Spectrums 30 Figure 3: American Megachurches 51 Figure 4: Scattered Life 78 Figure 5: Missional Map 79 Figure 6: Emerging Map 80 Figure 7: New Monastic Map 81 Figure 8: Megachurch Map 82 Figure 9: Hubbert Curve, 8 Wells 93 Figure 10: Uppsala Chart 95 Figure 11: World Oil Production by Type in New Policy Scenario 97 Figure 12: Price, GDP, Max Production Scenario 100 vi Glossary My arguments in the following pages are for the most part accessible, and will not lean on unexplained jargon to get any points across. This glossary shows that my most recurring terms are ones you’ve probably already used or can easily infer their