MEADVILLE/LOMBARD PRESIDENTS

Even Wikipedia is nervous about this term, but below is part of what they have so far.  They limit the idea to Christianity, so I don't know why they don't use current jargon and call it "trans-Christianity."  In my childhood it was called community churches and I read novels about it, like "The Calling of Dan Mathews" and "The Shepherd of the Hills," both by Harold Bell Wright. (1872-1944)  They were a pastoral small-town version of innocent white supremacy, what used to be called "community churches" which assumed a basic consensus in that parish..  Billy Graham sort of stuff.  The impulse also leads to Bible-based congregations that have no denomination.

"In Christianity, postdenominationalism is the attitude that the Body of Christ extends to born again Christians in other denominations (including those who are non-denominational), and is not limited just to one's own religious group. Its focus on doctrine distinguishes it from Ecumenism.  Many of the fastest growing Evangelical churches in the world do not belong to any "established" denomination, though the tendency is that over time the larger ones form their own organization (typically without calling it a "denomination").

"According to David Barrett, there are an additional 60 million Americans who are born again believers and do not attend any church. Though this is often due to faults in the church (some cite visionless leadership, unresolved sin issues amongst church bodies, lax morals in the pews, money mishandling, etc. in their reasons for not attending), postdenominationalists consider that the Church is at the center of God's plan for the world."  

What follows is doctrinal points based on popular American Christian doctrine.  Strangely, for a denomination that claims not to have dogma, the 2019 "UU Scholars and Friends" who attend the AAR/SBL [American Academy of Religion (AAR) and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL)] will be presenting a panel called "Post-Denominationalis and Its Implications for Unitarian Universalism: A Conversation in Honor of Lee Barker."  Barker was in the class just ahead of me at Meadville-Lombard so I recognize him when I see him, but I have no idea what he thinks.  He seems to have been qualified by non-commitment, which -- I guess -- turns out to be a virtue in personal terms as well as the dogmatic.  The speakers, mostly recent M/L grads, claim "transformative, counter-oppressive work".  Barker will respond.  November 23, 2019, San Diego.

The new president of M/L, Dr. Elias Ortega claims to have "expertise disrupting white supremacy in the most humble sensible way".  It never worked for me. 

There is a Facebook page, defying all news about Facebook's corruption and misuse of information. Typical UU websites are on Facebook.  Dr. Ortega also places papers at Academia.edu (as do I) which is a sort of Wikipedia for unmediated scholarly papers.