The New Ecumenists
Gen-X Christians are reinterpreting the meaning of church unity.
Lauren F. Winner | posted 2/05/2001 12:00AM
If you ever go to the Vine, bring your Bible, some business cards, and a good pair of walking shoes. But, most importantly, bring your voice, because those who attend this conference—mostly Gen-Xers—like to talk. They talk in the hallways, they talk over lunch, and they talk in panel discussions that cover topics from "Glorifying God in the Arts" to "The Soul of the Internet." Everyone serves as panelist, commentator, or moderator for at least one panel discussion. At last year's event, one especially lively panel explored "The Silent Priests: Media and Culture." A Princeton seminarian held forth about popular Christian icons, and a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago explained why evangelicals make such lousy movies. Carlos Aguilar, a performance artist-cum-Talbot School of Theology student, explained "What Aristotle and Snoop Doggy Dogg Can Teach Our Youth."
Visitors to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, a rustic resort community about 40 miles north of Chicago, usually come to enjoy a variety of leisure activities, horseback and carriage rides, boat cruises, and hot-air ballooning. But over Labor Day in the past two years, a group of about 150 men and women have gathered at Lake Geneva for the Vine. With a name inspired by John 15, this unique conference brings together an assortment of Christians, including clergy, scientists, students, and stay-at-home parents, for a three-day weekend of prayer, fellowship, and lots of conversation.
The conference's panel presentations are kept to five minutes per person, leaving plenty of time for debate and discussion, which inevitably spill into corridors and continue over dinner. Listen carefully to what the participants are saying and you may arrive at a surprising conclusion: Among the generation of twenty- and thirtysomethings, often written off as cynical slackers suspicious of the church, are thoughtful Christians who vigorously care about the soul, the mind, and the future of the church.
Seeds of a regeneration
The Vine conference was the brainchild of 28-year-old Jennifer Jukanovich, executive assistant to the president of the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU).
The seeds of the Vine were planted when, as a junior at Gordon College, Jukanovich participated in the American Studies Program (ASP), a Washington-based CCCU program of internship and coursework designed to help Christian college students connect biblical faith with public life and vocation. At asp, Jukanovich began to imagine "what it would look like if the church operated in a less fragmented way."
Those seeds were watered when, in 1994, Jukanovich took a job with Linda and Phil Lader, the founders of Renaissance Weekend, an annual gathering of leaders where, for instance, Bill and Hillary Clinton mingle with Ivy League intellectuals and media gurus, and where business magnates break bread with urban ministry leaders. As she helped the Laders coordinate the event for leaders, Jukanovich learned a few lessons about leadership.
"I became persuaded of the Laders' strategy of having leaders learn from leaders," she says. What would happen, she wondered, if young believers met one another "in a way that would allow us the opportunity to hear one another's stories, to grapple with issues together, to take the time to worship with one another as we cannot do on Sundays, and to dream together about what we could do together now in this moment as well as 20 years from now?"
Meanwhile, Andy Crouch, Bill Haley, and Joe Maxwell—three leaders of the Regeneration Forum—were having similar musings in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1994, the Regeneration Forum is made up of 20 regional discussion groups that grew out of the ministry of re:generation quarterly magazine, which Crouch and Maxwell serve as editors. The forums seek to bring together a cross-section of Christians from evangelical, Catholic, and Orthodox persuasions into a Christ-centered conversation across traditions.
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