Brian McLaren is a big name in what is called "the emerging church" or "the post-modern church"movement. Unlike Colson, who sees postmodernism as a negative thing - relivitism at its worse - McLaren sees Postmodernism as a natural historical movement similar to moving from the dark ages to modernism.
The book
A New Kind if Christian is a poorly written but somewhat decent introduction to their thought. It is about an evangelical pastor in a time of crisis who meets a progressive-thinking former-pastor-turned-history teacher who becomes an answer-man like mentor. He teaches the pastor things like:
o Modernists see the Bible as an "answer book" and use the Bible to prove something while postmodernists see that the Bible does not always resolve and strugging with the question often brings us closer to God.
o Modernists see things as either/or - you are either in the kingdom or out of the kingdom. Those who are out are seen as "outsiders" and those in are seen as "insiders". Postmodernists see evangelism much different. They would be less inclined to emphasize the differences of other religions (as a modernist) and more inclined to emphasize the similarities thus joining the person on their spiritual journey and discovering Christ together.
o More emphasis is put on community, artistic expression, religious symbolism. They rightly see that the evangelical church too often follows the corporate business model with the pastor as CEO. They argue that the church-growth "gather to a big meeting and then try to break out and disciple individuals" model needs to be examined. Though there are postmodern churches (McLaren pastors one in the Baltimore area), I don't know if they really came up with an alternative.
o Postmodernists would see someone as a function of his or her environment and culture and would be more inclined to celebrate a native American dance to Jesus in worship.
o They see evangelicalism as having been hyjacked by right-leaning conservatives. They argue that abortion and homosexuality has too long been the prime issue without regard to a practical response to poverty, homelessness, affordable housing, racism, and the morality of war. It is my personal observation as I read their literature that when they say "God is not Republican or Democrat", they tend to think of God in terms of politically liberal causes. While I think the church needs to do more in some areas such a HIV/AIDS I think they merely shift the pendulum to the other extreme and ignore abortion in favor of feeding the homeless and protesting the killing of war.
The problem with the whole concept of postmodernism is, by their own admission, there are really no established definitions. What makes it worse is that postmodernism tends to see definitions as modern constructs and therefore deny the validity of definitions themselves (thinks should be understood by their context, not by absolute definitions, some argue).
From a practical standpoint, here are those I observed in the Postmodern church movement:
o Those who are disillusioned with Evangelism and is reacting against it (much like the Jesus movement or the Plymouth Brethren had a dissatisfaction with the church of their day).
o Those who are really into postmodern philosophy and half the time you can't understand what they are talking about.
o Those who want to tie Christianity with politically liberal causes and who feel the church has aligned themselves too closely to the politics of Falwell, Dobson and Bush. It amazes me how often they (like liberals) make Falwell the "evangelical spokesman" as opposed to other capable thinkers such as J.I. Packer, John Piper and even Rick Warren (who did a great job on Larry King).
I personally don't care for McLaren both having heard him speak and read his book but others have liked his stuff. I object to his simplisitic critisizm of the evangelical church and he comes across as someone who wants to be a big fish in the emerging church movement. I personally (having grown up a modernist) have a difficult time not seeing postmodernism as an extreme form of relativism that fuels the diversity and tolerance (all views are tolerated, but some are more tolerated than others) movement as opposed to a simple and natural paradeigm shift in our understanding of the world.
I think a much better and thought provoking book is
Blue Like Jazz by Martin who writes a very honest book and, for the most part, hasn't departed so far that I get completely disguisted.
Another place to investigate this further is
www.theooze.com. It will help you understand a bit where they are coming from.
