church? aliens? what?

i just finished reading an article my dad forwarded to me. it's a few years old, by dr. thom ranier, and is called "ten surprises about the unchurched: understanding their hearts and minds."

i have a couple questions that arise from my reading of this article, and they stem more from feelings i get while reading and thinking than from fully developed thoughts. i would like to state them for you to help me with my thinking - agree, disagree, help!

first, read the article.

second, i don't like the term, or the way the term is used, of "the unchurched." that people are placed into this category of unchurched feels to me of us/them-ism. my question is this: how can we speak intelligently and gracefully about the reality of the difference in people before an encounter with the living God and after, without categorizing and making an in/out, us/them kind of environment or way of thinking? the way dr. thom speaks of this group of people makes me feel (as one who is not unchurched, but indeed seeks to spread the message of jesus) like a missionary with all the answers looking to help the poor deluded savages. i don't think that way of thinking is helpful, respecful, or in any way good. yet i also recognize an element of truth (albeit easily twisted into error) that we have the love of God "shed abroad" in our hearts and must share that with those who don't (the error being a belief that we have the message of God and all who would find that must find it from we few who hold the truth). how can we begin to speak and think in a way that balances the truth that we have a relationship with a person who others need to encounter, without somehow placing everyone who doesn't have this relationship in an outside category. i find it frustrating even knowing how to express my thoughts in words, for as i type i find thoughts colliding. i sense in my heart there is something wrong with how we have long engaged those who need jesus. i respect the heart of what dr. thom is trying to say and do in this article. i have no issue with him, but would like to use that article and the language used in it to point out what i think is a cronic error easily made (and made by myself for many years). i would like your engagement with this issue to help me sort my thoughts out into a more understandable way of explaining what i am feeling. i hope this makes at least a little bit of sense.

thirdly, my second question/issue arises with the conclusion implied in the article, expressly or otherwise, that church (or more church) is the solution for the "problem" of being "unchurched." i would like to suggest, rather adamantly, that more church is not what people need, if by church people think religion or religious activities. if by church dr. thom and others mean engagement with the living God through community with other jesus-followers, then by all means, invite people into the midst of that! i fear, however, that the language and wording of church, unchurched, and so on leads more to religion and religious activities than it does to real engagement with God and others. i fear that too often the religious activities we engage in when we attend "church," and the satisfaction we feel from participating in something deemed good by society and larger than ourselves and shared by people across the world, mask the ability of people to really engage with the truth that is jesus christ. i know that this is probably not true in your church, but how many people do you know that attend church because they think they need some religion in their lives, or because they like the positive things they get from going on sunday mornings? how many people think they need to attend church because religious activity is deemed to somehow be a positive thing in their lives? now, i recognize that their are many positive elements in religion, but there are also many horrible elements. i propose that following the way of jesus is not a religious activity, but a completely upside down, transformational way of living that encompases, envelops, enhances, transforms, and overwhelmes any religious activity. the way of jesus forces us to move away from our "me-me-me" focused living toward a "service to others" focused living. but how often are we taught this in church? too often it is about living right, doing the right things, and all kinds of religious stuff that are usually good at heart but lose their meaning and usefulness when focus on following the way of jesus in the kingdom of God is forgotten or ignored. i fear that inviting the "unchurched" to become "churched" is a fruitless endeavor. what can we do to help people move from not following jesus in the context of healthy community to following jesus in said community rather than merely helping them move from not religious to more religious?

those are my thoughts so far. what are yours?