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Great Emergence, The: How Christianity Is Changing and Why (emersion: Emergent Village resources for communities of faith) | 
 enlarge | Author: Phyllis Tickle
Publisher: Baker Books
Category: Book
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Rating:  21 reviews
Sales Rank: 2369
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 176
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.6 x 5.6 x 0.8
ISBN: 0801013135
Dewey Decimal Number: 270.83
EAN: 9780801013133
ASIN: 0801013135
Publication Date: October 1, 2008
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Product Description
Rooted in the observation that massive transitions in the church happen about every 500 years, Phyllis Tickle shows readers that we live in such a time right now. She compares the Great Emergence to other "Greats" in the history of Christianity, including the Great Transformation (when God walked among us), the time of Gregory the Great, the Great Schism, and the Great Reformation. Combining history, a look at the causes of social upheaval, and current events, The Great Emergence shows readers what the Great Emergence in church and culture is, how it came to be, and where it is going. Anyone who is interested in the future of the church in America, no matter what their personal affiliation, will find this book a fascinating exploration.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 16 more reviews...
 Informative not Theological (Not A Bad Thing) January 6, 2009
Phyllis Tickle is not a trained Theologian, but in her role as one of the founders of the Religion department of Publisher's Weekly she has had a unique position to see how Christianity and in particular writing about Christianity has shaped and evolved over recent years. Tickle recognizes that now, as has happened in the past approximately every 500 years, the church goes though a big change, and we are currently in the midst of one such change, which she has been coined the Great Emergence.
In the book Tickle examines the idea of the church having a major change every 500 years or so. She presents the work of Pope Gregory I around the late 500's who being the first Pope from a Monastic background, placed much church authority in monasteries. Then she reminds us of the Great Schism which happened around 500 years later and saw the separation of East and West in the Church. Thirdly Tickle presents the Great Reformation which happened another 500 years later and separated the catholic church from the protestant church. Now the author suppose we are coming into a Great Emergence. The next major change in the Christian Church.
I found the details of the previous three to be interesting but a bit lacking. I would of liked to of learned more, but I suppose they were just to provide a background for what she had to say about the current emergence.
As far as the great emergence, Tickle focuses mainly on North American Christianity and presents it as coming to center of the church, and moving away from solo scriptura. Her work unfortunately is brief and does not cover or go into detail as much as I would like. She doesn't really delve too much into the purpose of the emergence or the goal of the emergence, but I suppose she much like the rest of us don't know.
This book is more about taking a step back, seeing that things like this have happened before and are obviously happening now. Many complain that she is too vague, but I can't blame her, she is just telling us that something is going on and we shouldn't be afraid and here is a little of what to expect. It is not a work full of theological details or scripture references. But more then anything a work of Church History and Church Future. As I have said before I would of loved more detail, but I believe time will fill in those details on it's own.
 An erudite, passionate epitome of current changes in the Church January 2, 2009
She writes with a strong brush of enthusiasm for the change that has been occurring in the Church. And this change is big, no less than another Reformation, maybe even greater. This book gave me a great synopsis of the emergent (or emerging) church, that I only had a vague conception of before. She projects this change as something very edifying to the Church universal. I do not yet have an in-depth knowledge of this Change, Tickle, McLaren, and others to make personal assessments on some of their seemingly radical statements (i.e. postmodern locus of authority, deprioritizing of absolute truth and logic, ushering of God's kingdom down-top, etc) but even the mention of Change is a breath of fresh air for the Christian community that I've been familiar with. Book brings forth a great expectation. Hopefully, it's the antithesis of the second law of thermodynamics--maybe those quadrant corners could raise their steam to get this going even more forcefully.
What is happening in and where is the Church headed? December 31, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Phyllis Tickle is one of the spokespersons and historians for the Emerging/Emergent Church. Her premise in "the Great Emergence" is that there are major changes in Christendom that happen every 500 years and she takes the reader through those past events and brings us to the changes that are occurring now in the Global Church, particularly in the United States.
The reader will need to be prepared to read this book with a good dictionary at hand or by googling the definition of words online. If you are a history buff and a strategic thinker, this book will be a challenge to you. Ms. Tickle highlights timelines, people and events who have influenced along with inventions and technology to show what is emerging today in the global church. She spends quite a bit of time from the Reformation and what happened in the 20th Century and its impact upon the Church today, particularly regarding the centrality of Scripture and other trends that are shaping our faith and morality.
Then she shows what the church is looking like today and what is may look like or how it could be changing shape in the next couple of decades through a grid of those who come from liturgical, social justice Christians, renewalist and conservative backgrounds. I have heard Ms. Tickle speak on this subject and she is also an incredible speaker and one of the most popular speakers on religion in America today, not to mention that she is 70+ years old. This book will make you think and will encourage you to learn more of what is happening in the world and in the church today and hopefully to act upon what you learn.
The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why December 30, 2008
The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why. Phyllis Tickle. 176 pages. 2008.
My wife picked this book up for at the library on a whim. It sat on the shelf for about a week before I picked it up and read it.
The book is really divided into two sections. The first section is an excellent history of Christianity since about 500 AD. The history is brief, about 100 pages. The serious religious scholar will be disappointed because the focus is not on theological intricacies. The focus is on the general moves and its effects. Too often in seminaries the focus is narrowly theological and the wider context is lost. The author does a very good job of tracing out and extending the impact on society and society's reverse impact on theology. The strongest aspect here concerns the impact of sola scriptura and its reverberations. The context and effects was eye opening to me. I had not thought much of sola scriptura except in the theological bent I was trained in at seminary. The wider echoes are very thought provoking.
Because the author is going through almost 2,000 years in 100 pages there are many omissions which some readers will get hung up on. The focus here is not the details and pet niches but rather a generalization ... a big picture view of movements. The focus is also not on theological intricacies. This lack of nit-picking though is a great strength of the book.
The author traces various impacts of theology and society and the interplay in 500 year chunks. Sometimes these 500 year culminations make sense and a few of them seem contrived. The biggest contrivance is the current, "Great Emergence". The second part of the book is based on this notion of a Great Emergence.
I actually do not really understand what the Great Emergence is. The weakest aspect of the book is that the author writes from a point of assumption that the Great Emergence does exist and that everyone understands that it exists and what it is. To me it is still a mystery. Though I do admit that Christianity in America (and this is the decided focus of the book!) is going through a change away from the group and towards an individual version. This does present challenges to several denominations though it is really nothing new with in the Christian experience.
Perhaps the effects of the automobile and the changing dynamic of the family are of more important than many in standard denominations realize. All told this is a good book to read in the first 100 pages or so. It is more of an anthropological approach than a philosophical approach. It provides fresh insight into movements with in Christendom.
Important scholarly work on the Emergence December 28, 2008
Phyllis Tickle's work is an important scholarly work on the Emergent movement. However, it seems to be written for the seminary/Div school student looking for more credible scholarly sources to cite for their term papers. The language is frequently thick so bring your thesaurus. This detracts from the books effectiveness since so much of what the Emergent movement has been about has happened through and from the laity of the church.
Where Tickle succeeds is in the establishment of historical trajectory. Her extensive review of the landmark moments within church history takes nearly 3/4 of the book. This might seem overdone and irrelevant at times given the modern phenomenon she is writing about, but the historical references point to ingredients that have been brewing in this (post) modern movement for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years. This builds a strong case for this being a legitimate, established movement of change within the church.
If a reader is new to this movement or in the study of it, more approachable titles such as "An Emergent Manifesto of Hope" or most anything written by Brian McLaren are recommended before attempting such an academic effort as this.
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