Christianity without Congregation?

March 13, 2020 8:34 AM

Are there any major Christian theologians who did not believe in, or downplayed, the importance of an active church community? Who emphasized solitary instead of communal worship? I'm not interested in the "like God, but not church?" type groups. I'm specifically looking for scholarly theologians who, well, liked God but not church, or who wrote about religious practice when there was no community available.

I would also be interested in Jewish and Islamic scholars in the same vein

posted by Think_Long to Religion & Philosophy (13 answers total)

Hermits, like the Desert Fathers?

I think most of them thought there should be a church, but they personally went away from both church and society as a whole (so people went out to find and follow them).
posted by Huffy Puffy at 8:37 AM on March 13, 2020 [3 favorites]

St. Francis?
posted by Melismata at 8:39 AM on March 13, 2020

you might be interested in the history of Anchorites esp Liz Mcavoy's work Anchoritic Traditions of Medieval Europe and Anchorites, Wombs And Tombs : Intersections Of Gender And Enclosure In The Middle Ages
posted by PinkMoose at 8:44 AM on March 13, 2020 [3 favorites]

I would also be interested in Jewish and Islamic scholars in the same vein

I am not formally educated in Jewish theology so there could be something out there, but: Judaism without community is not really Judaism. It's one thing to briefly step away from society to "refocus" but Judaism is very much a religion in and of the world. There are a ton of key Jewish prayers that don't require any kind of particular clergy but do require a group of ten or more adults (a "minyan")

You can find a few examples in the Bible of ascetics but "Modern" Judaism, rabbinical Judaism, is in many ways explicitly focused on the community - and in fact a lot of things are collective obligations rather than personal.

You will find plenty of Talmudic scholarship about what to do when a Minyan isn't available; Judaism can get quite legalistic and there's always going to be at least a hypothetical answer to how to handle a situation. But that's going to be always treated not as a good thing, but rather "if you unfortunately cannot fulfil the commandment, here's the next best option."
posted by Tomorrowful at 8:47 AM on March 13, 2020 [8 favorites]

Along the point made by Tomorrowful, it would be interesting to hear how such groups consider Matthew 18:20 (Biblehub), "For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst."

This isn't a huge crowd, but implies that Jesus saw value in (small?) social gatherings.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:50 AM on March 13, 2020

There are a lot of very small Baptist churches that are essentially a single extended family, and that may not be part of a larger convention or organized denomination. They do tend to still call themselves churches, but might or might not count as what you have in mind.

You might also be interested in the Two-by-Twos, so called, who among other things don't believe in church buildings, church hierarchy or employees, or even having a name. ("Two-by-Twos" is a name imposed by outsiders.) They do still form congregations and hold meetings (mostly in homes), and so again might or might not count for what you have in mind.
posted by nebulawindphone at 8:51 AM on March 13, 2020

This isn't a huge crowd, but implies that Jesus saw value in (small?) social gatherings.

OTOH, it explicitly excludes groups of one. I've always taken that line as an affirmation of the idea that Jesus considered congregation and community key to the religion he was preaching; it's just that you don't need a grand worship hall with hundreds of congregants to have a community.
posted by tobascodagama at 9:06 AM on March 13, 2020 [4 favorites]

Does George Fox, the founder of Quakerism count? He rebelled against the church of the day, but more specifically against the clergy. He believe that God was reveled to everyone and the clergy should not be interpreting God's message. He did gather and organize people to worship in silence, however all were considered equal and anyone was welcome to deliver messages.

How about the Catholic priest and author Thomas Merton?
posted by tman99 at 9:28 AM on March 13, 2020 [4 favorites]

One place you might want to direct your research, depending on how you are defining "major Christian theologian," is the gnostic gospels. Many of these books, eventually rejected as heresy by what had become the orthodox/catholic Christian establishment, call for a way more individualistic relationship with the divine than what ended up in the Bible.
posted by solotoro at 9:57 AM on March 13, 2020

I suggest reading some William James!

In his book, The Varieties of Religious Experience, he discusses individual religious experiences at great length, but says very little about communal worship. His position seems to have been that religion is corrupted when it is institutionalized:

"In critically judging of the value of religious phenomena, it is very important to insist on the distinction between religion as an individual personal function, and religion as an institutional, corporate, or tribal product. I drew this distinction, you may remember, in my second lecture. The word "religion," as ordinarily used, is equivocal. A survey of history shows us that, as a rule, religious geniuses attract disciples, and produce groups of sympathizers. When these groups get strong enough to "organize" themselves, they become ecclesiastical institutions with corporate ambitions of their own. The spirit of politics and the lust of dogmatic rule are then apt to enter and to contaminate the originally innocent thing; so that when we hear the word "religion" nowadays, we think inevitably of some "church" or other; and to some persons the word "church" suggests so much hypocrisy and tyranny and meanness and tenacity of superstition that in a wholesale undiscerning way they glory in saying that they are "down" on religion altogether. Even we who belong to churches do not exempt other churches than our own from the general condemnation."
posted by HoraceH at 11:22 AM on March 13, 2020

Thomas Merton and St. Francis would not fall into this category, since The OP asks about solitary instead of communal worship. Francis founded an order of religious who lived in community. Merton lived in a monastery and traveled the world to meet with other religious (dying in a freak accident at an interfaith conference). Merton had a hermitage on the monastery grounds where he wrote in solitude, but he was very much a part of the community he lived in.

I can think of a tradition in Christianity of avoiding marriage. Nuns in convents used to be told to avoid “particular friendships,” which was code for lesbian relationships. But for people who live in monasteries and convents, community is an essential part of that.
posted by FencingGal at 1:14 PM on March 13, 2020

As a Friend (Quaker), George Fox does *not* fit. Fox experienced a direct connection with Christ while solitary, but he immediately sought to share his Truth with others, which is how the Religious Society of Friends began.

I Googled and found this website for Christian Solitaries, which includes a section on the history of solitaries in Christianity. I hope that site, or perhaps someone you can connect with through it, can be helpful to you.
posted by epj at 2:30 PM on March 13, 2020 [2 favorites]

Chiming in as another Quaker to say George Fox is not a great example, because Quaker practice really emphasizes corporate (i.e. group) worship, even if many (and in some areas of the UK and US, most) Quaker meetings do not have clergy.
posted by mostly vowels at 6:00 PM on March 13, 2020 [2 favorites]