Читать книгу Church for Every Context - Michael Moynagh - Страница 77

One is the idea of the mixed economy, which the Church of England diocese of Liverpool has couched in terms of rivers and lakes. Rivers of fresh expressions flow in and out of the lake of existing church, renewing the waters in the process. Rowan Williams has expressed his hope that over time existing and new forms of church will grow closer together, mutually enriching each other (Podcast, July 2010 extra, www.freshexpressions.org.uk). Crucially, this frames the new attractor not as fresh expressions standing against inherited forms of church, but as a more diverse church in contrast to a narrower version. A mixed-economy attractor is challenging a single-economy church, the old attractor.

Margaret Wheatley notes that ‘systems achieve order from clear centres rather than imposed restraints’ (2006, p. 132). She suggests that a new centre, a new attractor, should be built on meaning – such as: what does this new way of doing things mean to us in our organization? How does it fit it into the ongoing story of the organization? How does it enable the organization to achieve its goals more effectively? The mixed economy is an example of such meaning. If it is theologically well grounded, weaved into the denomination’s values and expressed appropriately, the idea has the potential to help churches interpret positively their journeys to greater diversity.