"Emergent" - Another Meaningless Word

"Emergent", to me, is like "baptist," it doesn't mean much anymore. If someone says they are or are not "emergent" you need to ask them to define the term...but these two borrowed posts are hysterical and pretty revealing...(the links are from where I obtained them)

http://krusekronicle.typepad.com/kruse_kronicle/2008/05/why-did-the-eme.html

Why did the Emergent Chicken Cross the Road?

Why did the Emergent Chicken cross the road? Here are my top ten reasons in no particular order:

• The Chicken was drawn to the candles and incense on the other side of the road.
• There was a Hauerwas discussion group at the coffee shop on the other side of the road.
• The idea to cross the road emerged from the chicken's generative cohort.
• It was more "post" on the other side of the road. (i.e, postmodern, post-evangelical, post-colonial, post-institutional, post-post, etc. Pick your favorite "post.")
• D. A. Carson showed up on the chicken's side of the road.
• Obama was on the other side of the road.
• To demonstrate that it is more environmentally sustainable to walk across the road than to drive across the road.
• Bono said crossing the road would save Africa.
• The chicken was seeking change. Everything must change!
• The question is merely a foundationalist modernist attempt to distill complex realities down to a single proposition in accordance with some metanarrative.

http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2008/05/28/top-ten-reasons-why-the-emerger-didnt-cross-the-road/

The Kruse Kronicle wrote a brilliantly funny post about why the emerging chicken did cross the road, so I thought that I would write why the emerger did not cross the road.

10. Because he did not want to be labeled.

9. Because he was not absolutely certain that he could cross since in order to get to the other side, you would have to go half way, and in order to go half way, you would have to go half way to the half way, and in order to go half way to the half way, you would have to go half way, ad infinitum.

8. Because it was not a labyrinth shaped road.

7. Because only arrogant people cross roads.

6. The liquor store was on his side. ( :) Come on, lighten up!)

5. Because they don't ordain women or homosexuals to street preaching on the other side.

4. Because everyone crosses the road, it must be wrong.

3. Because to cross the road you have to go West.

2. Because it was a one-way street.

1. Because he did not want to be accused of J-Mac-ing.

By the way, this is a great book: