The blessing of the bar isn’t a pagan ritual, nor is the bar (called The Taproom) unholy in some inherent way. In fact, since Terra Nova Church meets right next door it is a great spot for us Terra Nova types to gather. Some of us even meet there once a month for Theology at the Taproom. The folks at The Taproom are our neighbors and Ed Marcelle would readily call it an honor to call God’s rich blessing down upon a great gathering place with great ales. There are many principles at work here, but I think chief among them is the calling to affect our culture. This is a clear Biblical command and articulated most clearly in Mark Driscoll‘s outstanding book The Radical Reformission.

Inevitably, there’ll always be the chorus of legalists, isolationists, and curmudgeonly saints who invoke one of many false dogmas to not-so-nicely disparage this “blessing of the bar”. To these confused folk either the ale is evil, or the bar is evil, or the people in the bar are evil… blah blah blah. Whatever. I can’t help but want to suggest they read a Bible in their own language for a change of pace (yes, that was a subtle KJV dig).

Anyways, without further blabber, here is the video from the St. Patty’s Day 2007 blessing of the bar by Ed Marcelle. I wouldn’t have missed this anti-legalistic pilgrimage for anything… I was there on the second floor and you can hear me in the video yell “MARCELLE!” when he is introduced.

I am going to see TDVC because it will probably be a great movie and I like to see great movies. I like to watch Tom Hanks breathe an intangible but undeniable spark into the life of almost any character he plays. I try to only watch so-called Christian movies when they also are great movies on their own (like The Passion) or have some merit other than their “Christian” label. It makes no sense to watch inferior artistry just because of the label. Would you let a dubiously mediocre surgeon cut you open because he was a Christian?

I am going to see TDVC because it will be a topic of conversation for sure. The controversy alone has generated more dialog than any movie already released right now. The talk may well be questions about the validity of various parts of the movie… the accuracy of the historical references… the theological implications… and of course, the “could it all be true?”. Many of my friends and coworkers will come to me, being “the religious guy”, and ask me what I think about it or what my “priest” says about the movie. I know this from experience.

If I don’t see the movie I can’t enter into those conversations… I can’t directly and credibly engage those people with their questions. As a Christian I’m called to engage. Some Christians might say I could engage by speaking what I know to be true from the Bible about who Christ was and who Mary Magdalene was without having to see the movie… but it wouldn’t be as genuine, as applicable to specific scenes, or as honest. And it wouldn’t be as credible. Credibility is important, because there’s too many hypocritical Christians out there already. You know who you are… you who will condemn Desperate Housewives or Harry Potter or [fill in the blank]… and you haven’t even seen any of them!? All you know is that some schmuck behind a pulpit found it to be a convenient target to fill a Sunday morning rant session and you walked away with an opinion other than one you formed yourself. Now I’m not advocating diving headfirst into the sin city underground and steeping yourselves in every manner of worldly medium… there has to be some limits and you need to use your brain… but today’s Christians tend toward a missionally debilitating conservatism when it comes to culture.

Back to TDVC… I’ve heard Christians tell me that “I don’t want my money going to them”… but who is them? The “them” is probably about 75,000 people scattered over all of the cinematic industry, from marketers to mass-producers to theater employees to stunt doubles. The notion of keeping money away from a particular “them” is a fool’s notion. Your money will go to Hollywood in some form or another no matter what movie you go to. Then the argument Christians are ultimately making by proxy is whether or not to see movies at all, but that’s not the argument they’re vocalizing… so are they confused or intellectually dishonest? Or maybe just plain hypocrites? Christians have had a shameful streak of openly boycotting a “Judas” only to ultimately patronize a “Pontius Pilate”… whether we’re talking clothing, movies, restaurants… you name it. Here’s a tip – see the best movies, buy the best clothing, and eat at the best restaurants. Dig?

So you’d have to be an “outed” gay Muslim cleric hiding in a Pakistani cave not to have heard all the controversy surrounding this movie. Catholic and Protestant groups are calling for boycotts and disruptive litigation. But why? They say the movie is offensive… but how? Sure, the story has all the historical accuracy of an episode of the Teletubbies… much like most other stories from books and movies. Sure, it said Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, but does that offend you to hear someone think or say that? Are we all of a sudden offended by anyone with a different view than our own? Do we only see movies or read books that we already agree with? Who exactly, then, are we trying to engage? Many are seeking some truth from somewhere in this topsy-turvy world, and they just may look for it in TDVC… wouldn’t it be great to use TDVC to enter into a dialog with them about Jesus? Wasn’t that what the Book of Acts says Paul did in Athens?

Pastor Ed Marcelle of Terra Nova Church was a scrambled soul looking for truth in 1988, long before he became a pastor, when the movie The Last Temptation of Christ came out. The movie was met with much controversy from Christians for how it depicted Christ, so local churches would picket theaters and hold demonstrations. Ed recalls going to see the film and having to jostle his way through a crowd of Christian protesters who wore stern frowns of disapproval toward everyone they saw and stood in stiff-shouldered groups to impede entrance into the movie. What was the goal of any of that? What possible constructive purpose did that serve? None… those Christians may have had sincere hearts and some Biblical knowledge but they were acting like idiots. They could have brought a friend to the movie and then afterward talked all about Christ for hours over coffee… a priceless opportunity.

To my Christian readers, listen up a second. TDVC comes out soon. Don’t play the idiotic boycott game… and don’t let priceless opportunities slip away. Be like Paul in Athens and go see the movie. Because if you don’t then someday you may just have to explain why not. *wink* *wink* *nudge* *nudge*

Here’s a good site for TDVC error checking: www.davincidelusion.tv

Now you may want to know why a liberal, left-hugging periodical not known for being faith-friendly would take front-page notice of a conservative, Biblically-based church? Let me suggest that Terra Nova was noticed just as much for what it is NOT as for what it is. Terra Nova is not suits and ties… not felt pews and purple thrones… not smile-all-the-time-or-go-to-hell. This may seem very strange and foreign to many church-folk so stick with me. Terra Nova, quite simply, ventures to be everything of substance the true Biblical church is supposed to be while shedding any non-Biblical ideosyncrasies that traditional “church” has picked up along the way. Indeed, most Christians think that their traditions made popular in the 17th century (and subsequently converted into doctrine in the 1950′s) have their foundation with the very roots of Paul and Peter themselves! Many Christians think that singing songs not older than two centuries and not sung to pre-America drinking tunes are… *gulp*… of the devil.

Aghast! By what demon doth thou curseth me, oh wretched and horrible ghost, that thouest hath wrought my ruin upon the face of this leftist propaganda?!
- Any of the lesser Albany pastors after hypothetically being featured in the Metroland

Terra Nova is just a group of people who know they don’t have all the answers and are seeking Christ for those answers. And while we’re at it, let’s not pretend we live in a different century or on a different continent. Perhaps that’s just what makes Terra Nova stick out a little bit… we’re Christians who’ll readily interact with the rest of their own culture. Christians who see their church featured in Metroland and go “Cool!”

Oh yeah… it doesn’t hurt that the worship totally rocks, too. [Thank you Scott Womer]

Here’s some excerpts from the well-written article by Chet Hardin:

I was told before the service that the band would rock. That 800-year-old songs written by St. Francis of Assisi would be brought up to speed and the windows would rattle. That people passing on the streets would wonder what on earth could be going on inside Revolution Hall on a Sunday morning.

“It’s just Terra Nova,” Phil Taylor, executive pastor, said and laughed.

[...]

Taylor tells me they chose Revolution Hall because of its size (it can accommodate 800 people), its acoustics (it’s been billed as upstate New York’s “most advanced musical venue”) and because it’s just cool.

And that’s Terra Nova. A cool, confident, Generation X church that has come of age. The teaching pastor, Ed Marcelle, looks like an average Gen-Xer. He is dressed casually in worn jeans and a pullover zipper-neck sweatshirt. His hair hangs a little long, a little curly and a little out of control. Up on the stage, while he preaches, he paces slowly back and forth, like a college professor, feeling his way through his teaching with modesty and charisma. It is my first church service in 19 years, but I find myself completely engaged.

[...]

Stephen Bugler and his fiancée, Kim Cahill, in their early 30s, have been coming to Terra Nova since it started up four months ago. Bugler says he has spent years searching for a church that he could connect to.

“I went to a traditional church where everyone wore robes,” Bugler says. “And they had all these rituals that were completely dead to me. With Terra Nova, they are taking those ancient traditions and making them relevant to my life.”

Relevance is key at Terra Nova, says Cahill, who is the director of the Albany chapter of Campus Ambassadors, a national Christian fellowship organization. “I feel comfortable inviting a student to Terra Nova,” she says. “It’s like, they’ve been in Revolution Hall before. It’s not a church; it’s a bar. They are like, ‘Oh, I can do a bar.’ ”

“It’s nice to have a church where you can wear whatever you want and you can go and feel comfortable,” she adds.

But most important, they say, it is the core values of Terra Nova that keep them coming back. Terra Nova might be cool, but it is fundamentally, Biblically grounded.

[...]

[Ed Marcelle] says, “We are pretty boring and orthodox, in terms of ancient Christian belief.”

It’s true. Theologically, Terra Nova is nothing new; its core beliefs would appeal to any conservative evangelical. For all the guitars and the come-as-you-are aesthetic, this is not a liberal church.

Terra Nova members believe that the Bible is the unerring truth, the infallible word of God. They believe in original sin, wine from water, the virgin birth and the resurrection of Christ. They believe that there is only one God and that there is only one way to salvation . . . and that there is a Hell waiting for the unsaved and that a hell of a lot of people are headed that way. They believe strongly in marriage between a man and a woman. They believe that homosexuality is a sin, though they are quick to point out that persecuting homosexuals is just as much of a sin, and, for that matter, everyone is a sinner. And they believe that God’s truth is irresistible.

[...]

Terra Nova belongs to a large and growing movement of churches trying to break down [barriers] by reaching out and relating to the 18- to 35-year-old crowd. It is a movement of Gen-X pastors who listen to Radiohead, Matisyahu, Green Day and Death Cab for Cutie and drop quotes from Fight Club, Marshall McLuhan and The Matrix. They hold services in bars, coffee shops, dance clubs and auto-parts stores.

It is a movement in which authenticity is a coveted word. A quick scan of any of the thousands of blogs, Web sites and books dedicated to the Gen-X church movement, also known as the emergent or post-mod movement, shows just how important a marker for success authenticity is. It can make or break the reputation of young churches and pastors. Being in touch, being culturally relevant is vital. Be a member of your own community, and your community will be your congregation: This is the equation the guys at Terra Nova are operating upon. And their message seems to resonate.

[...]

The institutional church, Marcelle argues, has become so enamored with tradition it has become a preservationist society.

“It’s the fundamentalist and evangelical Amish of our day. It doesn’t look that weird now, but give it 100 years. I went to a church where they handed me anticommunist literature, like it’s 1955. I was like, ‘I don’t know how to tell you guys this, it might shock you. . .’ ”

There are so many people who want to have a dialogue about God, he says, “who were me when I was hanging out on Lark Street. And the Christian church, who is supposedly the keeper of those truths, isn’t talking.”

[...]

[Scott Womer says] “People are looking to something beyond this world.”

The church leaders at Terra Nova and in Acts 29 are touching a nerve in a seemingly secular and skeptical generation, a generation I have always thought was moving beyond religion in favor of science and relativism. But it seems I’ve been exactly wrong. Gen-Xers haven’t given up on religion; they’ve been waiting for it. And in the meantime, they have been using popular culture to express the same sort of wrought emotional outpouring, desperation for meaning and finality of action that now some of them are expressing every Sunday morning at Revolution Hall.

Amen.