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EDITOR'S BOOKSHELF REVIEW

"Jesus says that narrow doors and gates offer the only sure and safe entrance into God's realm of life," writes Caroline Westerhoff in Good Fences: The Boundaries of Hospitality. "Gates that swing too wide and doors that open too fast do not give us the opportunity to slow down and decide what is important before we make our choices." Indeed, the only time the Bible tells us to "fling wide the gates" is so that the "King of Glory can come in."

Good Fences: The Boundaries of Hospitality by Caroline A. Westerhoff Morehouse Publishing, 2004 192 pages, $14.95

The Early Church often worshiped behind closed doors, and joining the church involved a long process of instruction that could take three years. The lives of those who sought Christian instruction were examined, and people in questionable professions were rejected unless they changed their line of work. After three years of study, their lives were scrutinized again to see if they had been leading holy lives while they prepared for baptism.

Such a "narrow gate" philosophy was appropriate in a hostile culture where cycles of persecution came and went and being a Christian meant taking your life in your hands. Carefully screening strangers was both protection for the church and was only fair to the seekers: If it could cost them their lives, they needed to know what they were buying into.

Today, for better or worse, the church has adopted the wide-door strategy of retail marketing. When I go to a "big box" store like Target or Best Buy, I'm surprised if the door doesn't open automatically and wide for me. Churches that target the unchurched have noted this and a thousand other ways in which our retail culture welcomes all.

It is tempting to ask: Who should we emulate? The pre-Constantinian Apostolic Constitutions or Target?

But framing the question this way is unfair. It ignores the fact that the early Christians did indeed welcome strangers—but more with open arms than with open doors. Christians were noted for welcoming slaves, orphans, women, and the sick. It was the powerless who swelled their ranks, but not without careful preparation.

Today's cultural context poses particular problems—problems exemplified most dramatically in the global Anglican family, in which the Episcopal Church USA and the Anglican Church of Canada are acting the part of rebellious teens. In a recent article in the Guardian newspaper, noted New Testament scholar Bishop N. T. Wright complained about the extreme openness of the leadership in the Episcopal Church. He wrote: "Some contemporary Anglican discourse, especially in the US, has reached for two contemporary philosophical ideas: 'difference', echoing Derrida (though without his subtlety), and 'the Other', a central theme in Levinas. Frank Griswold, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church (US), has repeatedly urged that we 'celebrate difference' and 'embrace the Other'. In other words, we must be a broad church without nasty, rigid boundaries." Unfortunately Griswold has counterparts in other mainline denominations.

"Nasty, rigid boundaries" are important and useful. As Westerhoff puts it, boundaries create our identity. But unfortunately, "our current words and practices of inclusion too often can reflect sentimental and sloppy thinking." (As Wright said, Derrida without the subtlety.)

Part of the sloppy thinking, according to Westerhoff, is to confuse welcome (what we should do with those outside the household of faith) with inclusion (the process that makes people members of the family). "When we state that we welcome others into our particular boundary, we are also saying that for now anyway, they live somewhere else." But if we pretend there are no boundaries to the community of faith, we lose our sense of identity and have no "inside" into which we can invite those who are "outside."

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December 2004, Vol. 48, No. 12