Geography-based congregations

I've been processing my "personal" ecclesiology for a couple of years now, mostly in my brain's down time. Today I had a thought breakthrough. I was talking about a book I am proofing, which is entitled "Dead Church Walking" by Jimmy Dorrell.

One of my big vexations about church is the apparent complete lack of unity. Even if there is a little church which members get along well, serve each other, and serve the world, the congregation is still likely at odds with other congregations in the same town, probably because of theology.

I know that denominationalism emerged from the inability of disagreed parties to find common ground. That was probably fair when the leadership of the Roman Catholic Church was intractably corrupt and wouldn't listen to any critique. Luther didn't set out to found a new church; he simply wanted reform. But after a few splits over seemingly important issues, it became very easy to split just because parties didn't like each other during a disagreement. Now denominations (at least in America) seem to serve theological tastes, just as building, music, and preaching styles serve aesthetic tastes. Those are a few categories among which an individual can base their church attendance decisions.

However, one huge factor in church choice is transportation. With relatively cheap fuel prices, most people have no qualms traveling across town to their favorite church (selected on the above criteria). And here is the key move: the ability to traverse geography easily makes congregational diversity less likely. If I'm going to drive to church, I'm probably going to choose to mass with people who are rather like me.

I think one important way to encourage diversity is to commit to attending a truly local church. What if Americans did not travel further than one mile to their place of worship? They would be forced to relate with whichever people live near them. You are probably wondering about communities that are completely homogeneous regarding race, economic class, etc. I wonder about those too. I'm not sure I have an answer to that question. But as I look at my neighbors, there is incredible ethnic diversity in the two-house radius all the way around. If we were to meet as a house church, we wouldn't have the issues of ethnic homogeneity. However, we would all be middle-class suburbanites. But the important point is that we wouldn't be able to choose who we're with. I think taking some choice away from people—especially those in "higher" classes in America—would help to move focus off of self and onto really being the church.

Perhaps if people began to have their choice of church limited a bit, they may then choose to move into a more diverse setting where worldviews and skin colors are truly diverse. We may stop quibbling about minor points of theology because there would be much bigger preferences to sort out. And I think people would be less likely to break fellowship since they wouldn't be "standing for the truth" as much as discussing matters of taste. And this may be a small step toward a unified body of Jesus from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.