Seminary course to train post-Christendom church planters
TORONTO, ON—Western churches are systematically failing, says ecumenical church planter Connie den Bok. She will be teaching a new course on founding creative, non-traditional churches at Wycliffe College this fall, as part of the seminary's new "Pioneer" track.
Most Canadian church planting over the past 50 years has been "disappointing," den Bok says, because it has either involved "cloning" failing patterns of church or creating "new consumer choices" for existing Christians who are looking for the "hotter music, hotter preaching and better facilities."
Running alongside the seminary's existing master of divinity program, the three-year Pioneer MDiv aims at equipping "innovative and entrepreneurial leaders" to initiate new types of Canadian churches.
Pioneer students will take the standard biblical, theology and ministry courses as well as specialized courses on mission, culture and church planting. They will also be mentored by a church planter and have a placement in a "pioneering situation."
"It's not that we're training some for mission and some for maintenance," says John Bowen, director of the Institute of Evangelism at Wycliffe College. "While some are being trained to be missional leaders in existing churches, we want to train others in how to help start something new."
The track was inspired by recent moves made in Anglican seminaries in the UK, fueled in part by the Fresh Expressions church planting initiative.
Den Bok, a pastor at Alderwood United Church in Etobicoke, has helped facilitate three church plants—one of which recruited members with a newspaper advertisement.
"The traditional churches—as we've received them from Europe—are, without exception, significantly on the decline. Christendom is in decline. The era where Christianity was a dominant force in society may be over, or at least in hiatus," she says.
"So presuming that God is still in the business of transformation, how do we communicate the kingdom of God in an era where the old methods, and old churches, are increasingly not working?"
Den Bok's course, which was designed by the Fresh Expressions movement, will also be available for students at other University of Toronto theological colleges, and as a continuing education course for existing pastors.
"I can't imagine anyone in ministry who will not be getting into pioneering over the next 20 years," she says. Nevertheless, it can be hard for existing churches to get their head around the necessary paradigm-shift needed to create new faith communities.
"We are missionaries," den Bok says. "It is our job to see the kingdom of God to develop outside our doors. That can be painful and very hard to sell. Especially for a generation who has developed their identity of 'church' around a building and our job as attracting people into our pews to help pay for our new roof.
There are some people who think that if only they could get a better pastor everything will go back to being like it was in 1957.
"But this is not a glitch in the system before things go back to 'normal.' The world has changed and we had better respond to it."
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