Feral Church Children

"Feral church children" is a phrase that bothered some people, even though they liked the article on Building Faith. Ok. It is partially just my weird sense of humor. But then someone suggested "free range children" might be better and I got to thinking a little deeper.

Free-range children is a play on free-range chickens, right? Chickens (or children) are allowed to roam free - within their chicken wire boundaries. They are still constrained, in other words, our children can do whatever they want within the boundaries of the church we have built. Contrast that to the term "feral" which definitely implies a wildness, an unpredictability, a future unknown, and an unwillingness to be controlled by us. So actually, I think the phrase "feral church children" is a good metaphor. The church is what our children will make of it - like anything feral, we can do our best to shape it, feed it, and tame it, but ultimately it's going to go where it wishes to go. Our children will be the church however they see fit. And that's ok.