A recently posted, and then unposted pdf file containing a "Forge" response to the Carson criticisms of Emergent has stirred up a cauldron of comments on the Tall Skinny Kiwi's blog >>>. Alan Hirsch, National Director of Forge, and Tony Jones, national coordinator of Emergent - US, help season the conversation.

While browsing the blogs I ran across a rather comprehensive post from Brother Maynard about the whole "conversation v. movement" thing. One quote: "Well, everyone knows that movements have leaders, spokespersons, and meccas. We’ll stop and grant that Emergent has spokespersons, that’s a given. The rest is a bit more difficult. Spokespersons are normally leaders and normally operate from the meccas, but in Emergent there isn’t nearly enough structure or the will to create leadership structures or meccas. (Those are modern conventions.)" Here's my take on the mecca thing...Since none of the emerging church spokespersons is pushing a model, per se, and none of them are leading from a "mega-church" platform, there is no typical geographical ecclesiological mecca. My observation, the internet is the "emerging church" mecca. The conversation is more digital than it is analog. We would rather instant message than talk by phone...

Mark Van S blogs from the Emergent Convention in Nashville: ..."Almost everyone was white.  This is a clear problem.  I don't blame Emergent for making things that way, but it is incumbent upon them to bring about change.  The general style and approach Emergent has towards ecclesiology and ministry is much more accessible to middle class whites.  If I were part of the leadership of Emergent, I would work hard to build bridges in various ethnic religious communities and ask them to join the conversation...to the point of getting on my knees and begging them..."

I am going to pull a "Bill Cosby" here and say something totally, and completely, politically incorrect. The reason that the "Emergent Conversation" is mostly white males is "CULTURAL." There I said it...Let's think about it. Most of the conversation takes place on the internet, among bloggers. All tribes, tongues and nations have equal access to the internet. Why aren't there more voices speaking than the white male kind? [Just as an aside, I stopped by the recent consultation at Fuller and noticed that there are a lot of very tall, white guys, like Andrew Jones, Doug Pagitt, Kevin Rains and Mark Palmer]. Mark Van S, elsewhere in his post, commented that he thought there was better representation of women at the EC than at a typical evangelical conference. I wonder, however, what the women think about this? Why aren't the percentages more like 50-50 participation? Is the reason "CULTURAL"?

This is one area that I would love to hear from people, other than white males. In fact, calling all women, persons who are not white, and anyone else who is interested. Should the "emergent" folks get down on their knees and beg, like Mark Van S suggests? Can you force a person to join a conversation?