They write:

"It has been the source of conflict, pain, and controversy ever since. Evangelicals both within and outside the mainline denominations have called what happened there vivid evidence that ancient paganism has resurfaced as a virulent, new strain of old heresy in the very blood stream of the church."

Imagine that: "ancient paganism has resurfaced as a virulent, new strain."

Don't miss the irony evident in that statement: a self-proclaimed "Renewal Group" stands staunchly opposed to the exploration of any emerging theology - and when those who actually invite the church to moments of reflection and renewal experiment with theologies and liturgies that just might renew the church, these bastions of rigid orthodoxy spend the next thirteen years baiting narrow-minded misogynists into frothy fits of vitriolic and dyspeptic tirades that effectively shut down renewal of any kind.

About the report found on the website (which is actually advertised as one of their "Publications," a booklet that can be ordered or downloaded), the author writes the following:

"This is not an attempt at scholarship."

No kidding? It is anything but. Quotes pulled out of context, void of their intent and meaning, chosen specifically to shock the readers, fill the page.  

They go on:

"Our role is rather that of Paul Revere and John Dawes on the dark ride from Boston. We report that those who would subject the church to further tyranny of human ideology over our freedom in Christ are indeed on the march."

More irony: a church that permits such exploration and experimentation is accused by the narrow-minded who would keep every new thought and theology tightly clamped under the lock and key of their orthodoxy of subjecting the church to "further tyranny of human ideology."

There is a lengthy list of quotes from those who spoke at the Conference, from those who defended the right of the women in attendance to speak freely, and from those who believe a new heresy was emerging. It has the air of balance about it - but the publication is anything but. Perhaps the lowest moment in a page that is "anything but scholarship" comes with this quote:

 "The living world is the womb of the high human mind. The All-Mother gives birth to Knowing, Being and Mind. The concept of mother-child is therefore, the correct expression of the God-world secret. We speak of a modern nature religion when we speak of the Mind-child God, who lives in the womb of the All-Mother. The basic religious feelings are Union, Holiness, and Blessedness. On the other hand, the Christian sentiments of Sin, Guilt, and Repentance are not really religious feelings. They are artificially engendered complexes in man."
Professor Ernst Bergmann, German Nazi Faith Movement: 1934  

Ernst Bergmann was a proponent of the National Socialist German Workers Party whose theology was viewed by many as extreme. In time, he did come to support the rise of Nazi Germany. He would go so far as to claim that Jesus was not a Jew; that he in fact was an Arian - a true blue-eyed, blond-haired German.

I am not sure what descriptive word would be appropriate here. The author is correct: it would not be scholarship. To sink so low as to imply (threaten?) that any one who uses feminine imagery to express their understandings of how one may relate to God must, like the one quoted here, be a Nazi supporter just might be the nadir of this organization that purports to "renew" the church, and yet sinks to new depths in its zeal to silence new voices and to shut down the kind of dialogue that might bring renewal.

I did not attend this event in Minneapolis. I cannot speak specifically to its merits or its detriments. But I am not frightened by the thought of women gathering to imagine ways to speak to the feminine side of a God whose own creative energies brought forth man and woman in the image of God. For two millennia we have reduced this God to a creature with a penis. That women at the end of two millennia, having endured the shame and ignominy of patriarchal rule throughout, would convene to help us all discover new truths and - please, God - new rituals and new behaviors should be enthusiastically embraced by us all.

Was everything uttered or practiced there good theology and liturgy? I can't say - I wasn't there. I would suspect not - but in time we will all be able to separate the meaningful and eternal truths therein from the empty and temporal. That is how the church has functioned throughout the ages. It has proven itself flexible enough to tolerate such experimentation; and proven also that its rigidity has almost always engendered those moments that history has proven to be its most shameful.

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