Mennonite Weekly Review

OAK PARK, Ill. — Brian McLaren, an author and speaker, has conflicting views about the term “Christian.”

Brian McLaren speaks to a group at the Oak Park, Ill., stop of his “Everything Must Change Tour.” — Photo by Celeste Kennel-Shank/MWR

He is “trying to be faithful to Jesus,” he said in an interview while on tour for his current book, Everything Must Change: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope.

On the other hand, McLaren thinks it is important in the current global context to distinguish “between being affiliated with the Christian religion and being a committed follower of Jesus.”

That term, “follower of Jesus,” is more inclusive, he said.

“There are increasing numbers of Muslim followers of Jesus and Hindu followers of Jesus, and they do not want to be identified with the Christian religion,” McLaren said.

The distinction is clear when he considers early Anabaptists.

“By refusing to be baptized as infants, they were, in a way, opting out of being affiliated with the Christian religion even if it meant they would be misunderstood and killed and persecuted,” McLaren said. “It was a sign of radical identification as followers of Jesus.”

McLaren hopes the spiritual descendants of those early Anabaptists won’t lose their sense of distinction. He fears that is happening as some of them assimilate into mainstream evangelical Protestantism.

“For Anabaptists, the treasure is focusing on Jesus and the kingdom of God,” he said. “That, to me, is a treasure that Mennonites should be careful not to lose.”

McLaren caught the attention of many Anabaptists with his 2004 book, a Generous Orthodoxy, in which Anabaptists are named among more than 20 Christian groups with which McLaren identifies. He spends half of a chapter detailing the parts of the Anabaptist tradition he wishes to emulate: personal commitment to faith, discipleship, making Christ central, practicing peace, nonconformity, working at the margins and living in community.