Monday, July 31, 2006

Fall Schedule & new Emergent Village website!

Hope everyone is having a good summer in the heat! Emergent Village has just launched a new website at emergentvillage.org When you go there to check it out, sign-up to subscribe to the Emergent/C e-newsletter which is sent out each Thursday. It is a great way to keep up-to-date with all things related to Emergent Village. Yes, Emergent has changed its name (slightly) to Emergent Village to differentiate itself as an organization in the midst of the wider Emerging Church discussions. We have a good plan for the Fall with our Emergent Cohort in Baltimore! We'll have special guest presenters/participants in September, October, and November, who should be fantastic. We will gather from 7-9pm in the back room at the Bare Bones Grill in Ellicott City. So add these dates to your calendar and we'll see you then... Tuesday September 19th -- Tim Keel Tim pastor of Jacob's Well in Kansas City and a member of the board of directors of Emergent Village. He is passionate about creating spaces for people to connect to God, themselves and others. Tim was part of the early days of Emergent and helped get everything started. Wednesday October 18th -- John Franke John is a professor of Theology at Biblical Seminary in Hatfield, PA and is particularly interested in engaging postmodern thought and culture from the perspective of Christian faith in order to explore the opportunities and challenges they present for the witness and ministry of the gospel. He is the coauthor (with the late Stan Grenz) of Beyond Foundationalism: Shaping Theology in a Postmodern Context and the author of The Character of Theology and Barth for Armchair Theologians. He also wrote the forward to Brian McLaren's Generous Orthodoxy. Monday November 20th -- Peter Rollins Pete has recently published a book entitled How (Not) To Speak of God (Amazon link here). Brian McLaren is "a raving fan" of this book has described it as the result one who has mined postmodern philosophy and come back with something worthwhile. Pete has a BA in Scholastic philosophy, an MA in political theory and criticism, and a Ph.D. in postmodern theory. He is the founder of the Ikon community in Northern Ireland (a group which describes itself as iconic, apocalyptic, heretical, emerging and failing) and a working philosopher who believes that the emerging church presents a singular, unprecedented opportunity to transform the theological architecture of the Christian community. You can read his blog here. Wednesday December 13th a time of discussion and conversation to regroup from the Fall and plan for the Spring Hopefully the mix of days of the week with be a help, not a hindrance, allowing as many people to participate as possible. Also, don't forget the upcoming conference, The Story We Find Ourselves In, September 18-21 at Cedar Ridge Community Church in Spencerville, MD. For more info. Looking forward to seeing you this Fall, Tim