Queen City Mission: House Church in the 'Nati

I blogged over at Queen City Mission. Here’s a copy n paste:

Per Michael’s pondeirng…

Does Cincinnati deserve this rep [of a lot of well established house churches in the city]? And if so, why are there so many house churches? Is there something about the cultural DNA of Cincinnati that has produced such a widespread phenomena? Or is Cincinnati but a snap shot of worldwide growth in house churches?

Its hard to tell if Cincy deserves this rep. I don’t have much to compare it to, I know we have lots of emerging-ish churches of the house-ish variety. Of course I don’t assume that emerging church = house church, far from it, but it does seem that the those emerging communities of faith in Cincinnati tend toward some variation of house church. I suspect it has something to do with seeds that were planted 10+ years ago by folks in the Big Vineyard in the small group “movement” and with folks who start little, no frills house churches back in the day. These folks tilled the soil, as it were, and now folks (like us) can come along and plant things that grow (hopefully).

Is there something about the DNA of the ‘Nati? Not sure, maybe. Cincinnati somehow has a urban-feel and small-town-feel at the same time. The distinctive neighborhoods probably helps.

I think there probably is something of a snapshot of a larger house church movement, too.

However, the cynic in me also wants to note that while there are several house church networks in Cincinnati they are mostly contained within the white middle-class culture, be that urban or suburban. In fact I would even be so irritating to point out that even those urban (think “inner city mission”) house churches are made up of non-native white folks who have, for good Godly reasons, taken a vow of poverty and presence to forego typical American consumerism. These urban house churches do not (Vineyard Central’s included) find themselves populated by ethnic diversity or lower socio-economic classes (note the propensity of bloggers, Macs, iPods, and the like). This is not a dis, rather a simple reality (as I see it, at least). I don’t think Cincinnati will really experience anything in the way of a “movement” (which I’m obliged to be suspicious of all things labeled “movements” in the current context) of house churches until or unless small ecclesial expressions start popping up in the true margins of our society – the poor, the disenfranchised minorities, the un-privileged.