The Thirst for Identity in an Impersonal World

Recently, Lesley Stahl did a segment on 60 Minutes that addressed the latest identity craze - finding one's ultimate country/tribe/clan of origin through DNA analysis and comparison. Stahl interviewed a woman who had undergone such analysis. Initially, it appeared there was a definite DNA match, and that the woman could trace her origin back to Senegal (I believe, I can't quite remember now). Upon learning this, the woman was euphoric, believing that a whole new doorway had been definitively opened for her to better understand her identity. Almost immediately, she felt a sense of belonging and better understanding her place in the world. With this information, it seemed like the possibilities were endless in terms of researching her origins, reconstructing family history over many generations, and feeling connected with a whole community both past and present. The woman seemed to take this is as a watershed event in her life.

But perhaps unfortunately, Stahl wasn't done. Stahl then proceeded to provide this woman with other DNA analyses that pointed in different directions regarding identity and origins. One analysis indicated that her DNA pointed to the Ivory Coast as the place of origin. Another analysis said Ghana. It quickly became apparent that DNA origin mapping was not an exact science, and the woman was clearly a bit distraught that DNA analysis seemed unable to help with definitively giving her some sense of identity.

I took away a number of observations from watching this piece. First, these DNA mapping companies are very smart and will make a mint doing what they do. They are smart enough to realize that there is a potentially enormous market of people, particularly in the West, who would jump at the chance to learn more about where they came from. But why is this? Why does there seem to be such a powerful urge to answer questions of origin? This leads to my second observation.

Western society is increasingly losing touch with the personal and with the grounding of community. We live in a virtual world, where the virtual is largely replacing the real, and where beauty is literally being bulldozed for the sake of functionality. One only need reflect on the Springfield Mixing Bowl for a few minutes to see how the impersonal functionality of brute pragmatism has largely torn away the community fabric that once existed here. Functional relevance has come to dictate identity rather than the other way around. And people in increasing numbers likewise feel bulldozed and uprooted from community grounding, and this makes them hunger for a sense of belonging and identity.

In the church, pragmatism and functionality (for the sake of 'relevance') have become the accepted idols that are embraced. Pragmatic functionality might look different from church to church, but it's all the same in philosophy. Whether we're talking about the slicked-up corporate-style megachurch experience, or the equally calculated emerging church fad, identity and community are largely contrived and technique-driven, and mostly shallow. Churches have largely embraced the secular model of allowing their identity to be defined by relevance, so that 'relevance' (usually defined on the culture's terms) sets the agenda for the church and defines its identity. But of course, it's not difficult to see that this kind of identity is not much of an identity at all, because it's not grounded in anything perennial. In the end, the church itself looks just as rudderless and uprooted as the impersonal culture that drives so many people to hunger for something deeper.

This is largely why people are looking elsewhere to gain some sense of place, identity, and belonging. What churches, particularly liberal ones, don't understand is that most people need and want something more than flippant acceptance. They want a vibrant community with roots and origins - and challenging and conforming responsibilities. By definition, a community is some group that while containing differences, is nonetheless bound by unique and commonly agreed upon traits that are traceable back to previous generations. But when a church swears off its own heritage, abandons its theological tradition, and puts all the focus on present relevance and defining their future by what the culture might value next, there's no grounding; there's no tangible identity; there's no lasting sense of belonging; responsibilities are ethereal; there's no origin to commune with that roots the community. This means that the whole idea of identity in community loses its robust characteristics (identity), and becomes a fleeting (uprooted) enterprise marked by chasing (functionality) after the wind (impersonal).

If the church truly wants to be 'relevant', it needs to stop letting 'relevance' define its identity. A great paradox of the church that has often borne true is that the harder the church tries to be culturally relevant, the less effective it is in being culturally relevant. The church needs to know who she is in Christ. She needs to understand her own identity robustly, in community with its theological tradition past and present. In our day of having our sense of belonging uprooted by impersonal functionality, there is little the church can offer that would be more attractive than having its own robust sense of belonging define its relevance to a culture that has no sense of belonging. But doing this requires the church to ditch the arrogance that thinks it knows better than previous generations. The church must once again get in touch with its own origins and letting its identity be influenced thusly, rather than being totally obsessed with the here and now of doing church, and all the faddish flavors of the month that go with it. Churches that do the latter are only offering inconclusive DNA analyses to those who are hungering for something deeper and personal. The thought that the church would keep people from finding true humanity and identity in Christ because it's lost its own identity by letting cultural fads set its agenda ought to be scaring the dickens out of every pastor in every church. The fact that few seem to be concerned at all is very telling, and explains much.