TheBolgBlog

Korean Emerging Churches

For those of you haven't changed your links yet, I wrote on Korean Emerging Churches at my new website. Please join me there...

Does the Church have a Color?

For those of you who haven't updated your links yet, I asked at my new website whether the church itself ought to have a color. Please update your links...See you there!

Why I'm Voting for Barack Obama

For those of you who haven't switched your RSS feeds yet, I wrote an article on why I'm voting for Barack Obama. Here is the article:

Inverting the Pastor Pyramid

For those of you who haven't switched your RSS feeds yet, I wrote an article on how we need to re-think the structure of church from a pyramid to an inverted pyramid. Here is the article:

Jesus and Kos #3 - Mobilization

For those of you who haven't switched your RSS feeds yet, I began a series of mashups of Taking On the System by Markos Zuniga and the social life of Jesus -- looking to see what the church might learn about its social witness. Part III is here:

Jesus and Kos #2 -- Moving Past the Gatekeepers

For those of you who haven't switched your RSS feeds yet, I began a series of mashups of Taking On the System by Markos Zuniga and the social life of Jesus -- looking to see what the church might learn about its social witness. Part II is here:

DailyKos meets Jesus?

For those of you who haven't switched your RSS feeds yet, I began a series of mashups of Taking On the System by Markos Zuniga and the social life of Jesus -- looking to see what the church might learn about its social witness. The post is here:

Seth Godin, Tribes and Church

For those of you who haven't changed your RSS yet to my new website, I posted the beginning of a series of reflections on Seth Godin's new book Tribes. Here is the post:

Mock Political Debate in a Church Service

For those of you who haven't changed your RSS yet, I wrote a mock poltical debate that can be used in churches (using Sadducees, Pharisees, Zealots, and Essenes). It plays off of our political debate culture. We used it in a church service last week.
Here is the skit (about 10 minutes)

Emerging Churches within Denominations

For those of you who haven't changed your RSS to my new website yet, an FYI: I posted on how the emerging church works within denominations...

"Country First" not an Option for Evangelical Christians

For those still coming here and haven't switched their RSS yet, on my new blog I wrote a post referring to "Country First" as not a real option for Evangelical Christians.

I've moved on!

Hi -- I'm not blogging at this site anymore - I'm blogging now at www.ryanbolger.com.

Mission in American Culture

My mission in American Culture class got a good start this week. We will be taking a look at the American elections and explore options for Christian engagement within political cultures. Like my other class, we'll be using a wetpaint wiki for the homepage and netvibes for the updates. We will also be posting to a political blog -- it doesn't have much on it now, but as a class we will be posting on it from now until the first week of December. Our hope is to culturally exegete American political culture.

#Churchtechcamp

I'll be at #churchtechcamp today at Fuller Seminary -- it is "a localized unconference for people of faith to gather and share their own best practices and "in the field" insights."  Looking forward to meeting all the people and hearing what they have to say...

The Church in Mission 2.0

I made the mistake of watching pedagogical rock star Michael Wesch's video a couple weeks back. It got me thinking about transforming one of my fall classes more fully into Web 2.0. I began tinkering with my Church in Mission course (with help) -- it is a course I teach once a year to 60 MA students at Fuller Seminary. After talking with friends, I decided to create a couple of new things in the course this year, both in terms of web platform and content.

Web Platform:
Instead of a blog for the home page, students will access the class on a wetpaint wiki. This allows them to add to and change class resources easily. Students may upload course notes for each lecture up to the wiki (and therefore collaborate on the class notes). Students will also use netvibes to track their twitter feeds, wiki changes, diigo bookmarks, and youtube videos for class communication and research. Student group projects will include creating and maintaining a wiki and a youtube video.

On the content side:
I've changed the course to connect the disciplines of ecclesiology, missiology, postcolonial studies, and race/ethnic studies. In the class, student groups will reflect on the historical and contemporary church experience for particular ethnic groups in the US or overseas (along denominational or regional lines), and create group wikis and youtube videos that explore how the following postcolonial themes manifest in that particular tradition: diaspora, identity, race, cultural difference, hybridity, gender, sexuality, feminism, postmodernism, nationalism, globalization, and empire. Students will collect and analyze the stories of these communities and explore how we might be the "sent" people of God in the midst of these powers.

The class starts next week and runs for ten weeks -- I'll give an update as the quarter progresses. I made changes to my other fall class -- I'll write that up in the next few days.