Working on a paper (which will eventually be a chapter in a book on Christianity and Responding to Tyranny) where I am arguing that it was the household gathered-church of strangers and unequals that challenged and changed everything--the local church was God's way of addressing the issues of racism, oppression, and inequality among human-beings.
Here's a tentative conclusion to the section on the table, household baptism, and kiss that changed everything:
Here's a tentative conclusion to the section on the table, household baptism, and kiss that changed everything:
"Every act or ordinance created or adapted and used by the apostolic and early church had one thing in common: each accomplished and spoke to unity among earthy unequals. The table, household baptism, and the kiss embodied a way of defining a new identity and maintaining the bond of a community as a people who didn’t (socially, culturally, economically, legally) belong together. As established habitus of the gathered-church, they were creating a wholly new understanding of humanity-together, a new social reality in Christ. A household gathered-church (multiplied and embedded throughout the empire) was a new living social context of people, a reality of the death of Jesus, creating subversive social mapping that challenged and changed everything concerning the hierarchy of human relationships." |
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