Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony

I was startled to find that he had a whole new way of looking at things that I never really quite thought of as lucidly as he and Willimon have. Not only does he highly criticize the church for continually buying in to a Constantinian view of the church, he even critiques such great Theologians as Neibuhr! When someone does that, they either are supremely misinformed or have something very thoughtful to say, and, indeed this book does the latter.

Resident Aliens will make you see the church in a whole new light. Members of congregations and pastors alike must read this book as I think it would impact you ministry for God more than any other "seeker friendly" or "purpose-driven" book could possibly do. It particularly is a book that both uplifts and criticized the role of a pastor in a church.

While often bleak, Hauerwas and Willimon are brutally honest in the church impotence in BEING the church and instead has often simply become little different than a club where people come to get their "needs" met. The colony image, while not perfect, is challenging as it highlights our need to care for one another, to be, as Rodney Clapp says, "A Peculiar People", and to have our ethics driven by a biblical community, not a national idea of "rights" and "liberties".

If I could suggest a book to read for Christians this year, this would be it! Unfortunately, this book has been out for years and I do not see that it has had the impact that it should have. When the full weight of the reality of the post-Christian society we live in in the West hits us, books like this will be our saving grace. Either that, or we compromise until we become indistinguishable from the people around us.


An agenda-setting work for the contemporary church   May 31, 2000
Victor McCracken (Atlanta, GA USA)
23 out of 25 found this review helpful

Hauerwas and Willimon offer a stunningly adept diagnosis for mainline churches and a prophetic warning for evangelicals. Like the evening sun, Christendom is setting in the west, and in this dusk the church has a new opportunity to reclaim the marginal identity God granted it in the first place. If you are a big fan of the Christian Coalition, this book will trouble you. If you believe that church and state go neatly hand in hand, this book will trouble you. If you are searching for perspective on how the church--for the sake of "relevance"--may lose itself in the prevailing culture, this book will be a welcome addition to your library.

Ten years after its publication, RESIDENT ALIENS remains a valuable conversation partner for the church. The task remains for church leaders to enflesh the practical ramifications of the work in Christian community. Ultimately, the success of Hauerwas' and Willimon's work will be judged by that end.


The death of Constantinism, what should the church do now?   March 30, 2000
Mike Parkhurst (Newbury Park, CA)
10 out of 11 found this review helpful

If you are looking for a book that will wake you up out of your preconceptions for what the church is or should be, then this book is for you. Even though the book was published 11 years ago it still has great relevance today. Early on in the book the authors make the statement that the day stores stayed open on Sunday was the end of the Constantinism era. In the year 2000 that truth is even more evident! The first three chapters are spent building the case for what the church should be like in a world that no longer supports it. Next comes a review of how pastors experience burnout in trying to please the community/congregation by making the world "a little bit better" to live in. The last chapter is sharp criticism of the seminary process that sets pastors up for failure instead of equipping them for the task leading a flock. This book, more than any I've read to date, has caused me to think and reevaluate what the church is and should be.


A ground-breaking reappraisal of the post-Christendom church   August 10, 1999
Steve Harvester (Norwell, MA USA)
27 out of 28 found this review helpful

"Resident Aliens" came out in 1989 and continues to be a controversial bestseller among church leaders. The authors argue that the days of "Christendom" are over--Western culture no longer looks on the church as an important prop or support to its values, and will no longer subsidize the church in any way, viz. soccer games and open malls on Sunday morning. And, this is a good thing! At last the church has the opportunity to recapture its role as described in scripture: a colony of "resident aliens" in a foreign country, demonstrating in word and deed that God is God indeed. For church folks who grew up in the 1950's and earlier, this book is a tough pill to swallow. But it points the way toward a revived church with a crucial mission to the world as we begin the "post-Christendom" millenium.