The Congregation in a Secular Age, Andrew Root
The Congregation in a Secular Age, Andrew Root
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The Congregation in a Secular Age
Keeping Sacred Time Against the Speed of Modern Life

Author: Andrew Root

Narrator: Mike Lenz

Unabridged: 10 hr 28 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 02/14/2023

Synopsis

Churches often realize they need to change. But if they're not careful, the way they change can hurt more than help.

Leading practical theologian Andrew Root offers a new paradigm for understanding the congregation in contemporary ministry. He articulates why congregations feel pressured by the speed of change in modern life and encourages an approach that doesn't fall into the negative traps of our secular age.

Living in late modernity means our lives are constantly accelerated, and calls for change in the church often support this call to speed up. Root asserts that the recent push toward innovation in churches has led to an acceleration of congregational life that strips the sacred out of time. Many congregations are simply unable to keep up, which leads to burnout and depression. When things move too fast, we feel alienated from life and the voice of a living God.

The Congregation in a Secular Age calls congregations to reimagine what change is and how to live into this future, helping them move from relevance to resonance.

About Andrew Root

Andrew Root is Carrie Olson Baalson Professor of Youth and Family Ministry at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is the author of more than twenty books, including Faith Formation in a Secular Age, The Pastor in a Secular Age, The Congregation in a Secular Age, Churches and the Crisis of Decline, The Church after Innovation, and The End of Youth Ministry? Root is also coauthor (with Kenda Creasy Dean) of The Theological Turn in Youth Ministry. He is a frequent speaker and hosts the popular and influential When Church Stops Working podcast.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Drew on August 03, 2023

Best of the trilogy.......more

Goodreads review by Robert on April 13, 2021

Does time seem to be accelerating at a pace that far exceeds our ability to keep up? Does that sound about right? That feeling that time is passing by too quickly might be one of the reasons we look back with fondness at what seems to be a simpler time, like when we had dial phones instead of these......more

Goodreads review by Matthew on May 22, 2022

The general conclusion that Root eventually arrives at is good. I appreciate his emphasis on relationship and the value of personhood for its own sake as remedies to the ills of the current era. However, getting to that conclusion was a rough and frustrating journey, and even the end of it still hel......more

Goodreads review by Andrew on January 22, 2022

As a pastor in the 21st century, I have all of these inklings that things aren't working, and that by simply trying hard, we're going to eventually run ourselves ragged. I think about the ways culture has changed in just the 10 years since I was ordained. In 2012 everyone had to have a blog, and tha......more

Goodreads review by Jill on July 04, 2023

This book is an excellent, practical theology for exhausted congregations and pastors. Root’s series has been overall excellent (although I appreciated books 2 and 3 more than 1). I highly recommend reading the series for a new take on innovation/change rooted in the sacred of relationship.......more

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