Philosophy of Sacred Space

I stumbled upon Cultivate 2011 through Kem Meyer’s tweet. The whole conference blew my mind. I thought I was the only communications nut who geeks out on comm theories and technologies.. especially when they’re geared towards sending out the most important message of all – God’s love. If you want to know more of my thoughts on Cultivate, click here.

Aside from realizing I’m not so weird afterall (okay fine, I’m still a little bit weird), Cultivate 2011 introduced me to Mel McGowan, president and founder of Visioneering Studios. I admit I didn’t hear much because I was listening at work while multi-tasking. But he did talk about creating relational environments. That piqued my curiosity so I started digging a little bit deeper. Came across one of his interviews about theology of place. You can check it out here.

One of my favorite philosophers, Jurgen Habermas developed the philosophy of the public sphere wherein people commune to talk about their ideas. It is here where ideas are exchanged and refined. I think that is something the church can focus more on. Providing that sacred space. As much as we are all drowning in Web 2.0 innovations, the craving for connections are higher than ever. People are created to be relational and that includes physical location. Mel McGowan talked about using environments to frame up  this sense of community. These environments should have enough consistency and intentionality in how they are set up. Even the most minute details add up to a bigger meaning.

This takes me back to one of my favorite Philosophy courses in college – philosophy of religion. I admit it was painful philosophizing at 7:30am with a Jesuit priest for a professor. The discussions were interesting. I remember a particular one that talks about meta-narratives of religion and encountering the Holy. Combining it with Habermas’ public sphere, churches should provide this so-called “3rd space” for community to be built up and relationships fostered. I’m sure most Christians would agree that the church is not just a building. However, meeting in a physical place provides that human element that all the social networks in the world can’t provide. It doesn’t have to be grand. But as McGowan said, the details should be deliberate enough to covey a bigger meaning. In the Church’s case, we’re there because of our common love for God, faith in Him and fellowship with one another.

I guess the challenge for internet churches today is to re-create that same “sacred space” online. I know real-time question and answer and Twitter hashtag discussions help a lot. But is that enough? Should we still be using these technologies to bring them everyone to a local geographic location? There would be exceptions, of course (i.e. sick, elderly, people who can’t drive, etc.) But in general, while we belong to the Church, worship and learn from internet churches, should we still strive to gather and commune in a localized church? The apostle Paul did write most of the New Testament to specific local churches.

Question remains – is it a double-edge sword really? Is it really a choice between 2 extremes – the localized relational environment on one side and virtual public spheres on another? Or maybe the best way to go about it is if they can go hand-in-hand as tools to complement each other, one not being as strong without the other. I think I’ll ponder about this a little bit more..