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98 | 4 Ancient-Future II Everyday Monastics In late October 2008 I waited in a coffee shop for Glenn. It was a Friday afternoon and the atmosphere was bustling, nearly frenetic. The activity was explained by the start of weekend socializing, the unseasonably warm, sunny weather and a fast approaching presidential election. Political talk filled the air alongside the permanence of coffee smells and the occasional , halting grind of an espresso machine. I had not talked with Glenn for over a month and was excited at the prospect of another follow-up interview. Glenn is an east Tennessee native and retains a thick, Appalachian drawl. It complements the half-smile he mostly prefers. He is fit and well-built from marathon training. His closely shaven head keeps a receding hairline barely visible, and he usually hangs a small, gold hoop from his left ear. Glenn arrived that afternoon in dress slacks, a short-sleeve button-down shirt, and silk tie. This was unusual. Previously, I had seen him in strictly casual, sporty attire. My memory returned: he had recently started a new job. For several years Glenn had worked as a public bus driver in the small, university town where he and his wife planted their church. He described being a bus driver as an invaluable way to “learn this culture” and to “be around students in a unique way.” But the pay was not sustainable. His new job—twenty-five miles away—was as an academic advisor and part-time teacher at a Christian college. We spent the first few minutes talking about his new job. He explained the daily routine, the rhythm and nature of the workday. He seemed genuinely delighted with the change. Thinking nothing of it, I quipped that he probably didn’t “miss being a bus driver.” Kindly, but quickly, Glenn corrected my gaffe: Actually, I do. I miss the extreme simplicity of it. There’s something about driving around all day in a circle that really forces you to learn discipline. It allows you to learn to be content with what you’re doing. Ancient-Future II | 99 The interview continued for nearly two hours. Toward the end, prompted by the electoral season, Glenn asked if my research addressed the Evangelical -political nexus. I used his question to ask my own. Had he watched the “Leadership and Compassion Forum” two months earlier? The event was the first of its kind: two leading presidential nominees answered questions posed by an Evangelical pastor, hosted at that pastor’s church, and broadcast for a national television audience. The pastor was Rick Warren, who several months later would give the invocation at Barack Obama’s inauguration . Glenn watched the Forum and was “revolted.” He thought the whole production suffered from the same problem that plagues all public Evangelicals : attention had shifted to issues other than “who Jesus was and what he did” as definitive of “orthodox Christianity.” He continued: “Everyone has an agenda in politics and Christians should not be beholden to anyone.” Glenn never told me who he planned to vote for, only that he was not registered as a Democrat or a Republican. Glenn’s reflections on bus driving and politics were not delivered with happenstance words. They trace the contours of the kind of Christianity he desires. References to “simplicity,” “discipline,” “contentment,” and being “beholden” are building blocks for incorporating monastic values and traditions into everyday life. Many Emerging Evangelicals, like Glenn, emphasize acts of remembering and practicing monasticism in their individual and congregational lives. Integrating monastic elements is an extension of the ancient-future phenomenon, distinct from worship but issuing from the same logic: reclaiming a lost sense of authenticity in their faith by connecting with church history. New Monasticism as Lived Religion Emerging Evangelicals attracted to monasticism have used the term “new monastic” since at least the late 1990s. New monastics do not live in the confines of monasteries, but they regularly practice values and traditions derived from monastic Christianities, the histories of which date to the Patristic era. Being a new monastic is a self-conscious act of embodied social memory, and can take several forms. Some individuals do this remembering in a bricoleur fashion, appropriating only selected practices. Others participate in loosely knit collections of individuals who work together to remember. And still others live in intentional communities in order to make this remembering definitive for their lives. We might say that while all New Monastics are Emerging Evangelicals, not all...

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