What do you think?
Rate this book
Living Out of Control: Political and Personal Faith in Waning Christendom
Living Out of Control is an inviting exploration of how American Christians can respond most graciously, effectively, and faithfully to our political situation amid waning Christendom. This Christendom is diminished but not dead, and many Christians despair of that reality and dream of the reassertion of Christendom. Clapp argues that Christians (like Jews) have often lived out of in fact, the Bible largely pictures circumstances in which followers of the God of Israel were . Including a critical chapter on the most pressing and dramatic proponents of Christendom's reassertion (Christian nationalism), the book depicts how we may now best live as Christians--without the reassertion of Christendom. It attempts to spark and remold our imaginations, with hopeful chapters on prefigurative politics, the Christian anarchic tendency, friendship, and resonance. Short and eminently accessible, it aims to be widely read and reread, almost as a handbook to form and reform imagination.
135 pages, Paperback
Published February 18, 2025
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 26, 2025
Rodney Clapp has a suggestion for the church and her devotees as their ability to control things declines. Just give it up. Stop trying to be in control of everything. Instead, try a little anarchism, be more friendly, and attune your means of contributing to well-being in this world to our Creator’s intentions. It’s a provocative set of proposals, articulated with clarity and passion, and crafted into a compelling and convincing possibility for the church’s missioning in our times in North America.
The church has tried to control things, often with great success, since Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. What has come to be called Christendom has been losing its grip for quite a while now, certainly since two great “Christian” nations inflicted the horrors of World War One on each other’s empires. Christendom, Clapp believes, “is fading and besieged.” (p.2) But it is not, as he previously thought, gone. It no longer controls the political or cultural orders, but there are influential proponents for the restoration and reinvigoration of Christendom as a means of gaining control of America’s politics and culture again. He likens this movement to the kudzu, a plant known as “the plant that ate the South,” that is not easy to eliminate. “You can spray it, uproot it, try to tear it out of the powerlines and the trees, but it will keep coming back.” (p.3)
As a counterpoint to his advocacy for the Christian church living out of control, he does an astute analysis of one of the most compelling proponents for Christian nationalism, Stephen Wolfe, and his book 'The Case for Christian Nationalism' (Canon Press, 2022). Wolfe is an independent author and podcaster based in North Carolina. He draws much of his inspiration from 16th and 17th Reformed scholastic and political theology, especially the natural law framework of Johannes Althusius (1563-1638) to, in his words, “reinvigorate Christendom in the West.”
Clapp summarizes Wolfe’s vision as follows:
• that Congress declare America a Christian nation
• that Jews, Muslims, and other non-Christians not be allowed as lawmakers;
• that women be subordinated in the home, church, and government;
• that a great man will restore Christendom;
• that natural law, as he understands it, should rule;
• that Christians today are living under a secular imperialism and captivity; and
• that Christian nationalists should be willing to kill to institute their vision of America’s divinely-bestowed manifest destiny.
Clapp’s alternative vision is intriguing. It involves anarchy, friendship, and resonance. He urges Christian churches to become “prefigurative” communities, embodying a public presence that involves the “deliberate experimental implementation of desired future social relations and practices in the here-and-now.” (p.42) This involves, for the church, a willingness to live “out of control” in the sense that it co-exists with and honours pluralism and secularity. It involves a church that learns the persuasive, humble, and patient ways of our Creator revealed in Jesus, the Christ. In that way of missioning, we are inspired and instructed by the Spirit. Thus, we will “find our place in [the Bible’s] grand, all-encompassing story.” (p.25)
Anarchy, for Clapp, is an approach to engagement with the world that recognizes that the good – human freedom and dignity – in any worldly situation is but a prefiguring of the final consummation of the Kingdom of God, though that Kingdom is already at work among us and within us. He composes his version of the anarchistic tendencies that would best suit a faithful, wise, and effective witness for the church in conversation with these theologians:
• Jacques Ellul, a French Reformed teacher and writer whose most influential work warned of the control being imposed by technology;
• Davor Dzalto, an Orthodox theologian of Bosnian-Herzegovinian origin currently teaching in Stockholm, who advocates contextual fighting against oppressive power structures in any realm of human life, especially through music and medicine;
• Karl Barth, perhaps the most influential theological in the West in the 20th century;
• Vernard Eller, an American Brethren theologian and pacifist, who criticized worldy politics as resting on “a quite unfounded confidence in the moral competence of human beings” and encouraged the church to live “nonimpositionally.” (p.73); and
• Mark Eric Dyson, a Baptist minister who teaches at Vanderbilt, who saw Black theologians in the civil rights movement translating their Christian language into “a public, civic piety … love’s public language, equality in its tone of voice, and freedom its constant pitch.” (p.84)
The anarchist tendencies that Clapp draws from these conversations are composed to encourage the church to “live out of control in the sense of not lording it over others, and in the sense of not living under the control of others.” (p.85)
Friendships, especially as understood by Gary Chartier in Understanding Friendship: On the Moral, Political, and Spiritual Meaning of Love (Fortress, 2022), are for Clapp “a school for living out of control.” (p.102) Friendships, including and especially our friendship with God, are gifts to be received and appreciated. We cannot control them, but we can be redeemed through them.
Resonance, especially as understood by Hartmut Rosa in Resonance: A Sociology of Our Relationship to the World (Polity, 2019), refers to the dynamics of friendship that enhance and expand the positive results that emerge in ways that are out of the control of any individual involved in the relationships. We can’t fabricate or force it. We can only be more or less open to its gifts. Such resonate relationships amplify the flourishing of justice and peace.
Clapp promised his readers he would offer a different way of comprehending the missioning of the church in our day, a way that draws on the experience of the faith communities of the bible, communities that were not in control of politics or culture, but were able to respond faithfully in their contexts, develop an intriguing Christian anarchism, find resonance within themselves and with the world, and offer friendships in lonely and desperate societies. He has done so very well in this inspiring and instructive book.
There are many provocative insights that cannot be summarized in a review. I encourage you to read the book, immerse yourselves in the conversations, and be uplifted for your missioning.
The church has tried to control things, often with great success, since Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. What has come to be called Christendom has been losing its grip for quite a while now, certainly since two great “Christian” nations inflicted the horrors of World War One on each other’s empires. Christendom, Clapp believes, “is fading and besieged.” (p.2) But it is not, as he previously thought, gone. It no longer controls the political or cultural orders, but there are influential proponents for the restoration and reinvigoration of Christendom as a means of gaining control of America’s politics and culture again. He likens this movement to the kudzu, a plant known as “the plant that ate the South,” that is not easy to eliminate. “You can spray it, uproot it, try to tear it out of the powerlines and the trees, but it will keep coming back.” (p.3)
As a counterpoint to his advocacy for the Christian church living out of control, he does an astute analysis of one of the most compelling proponents for Christian nationalism, Stephen Wolfe, and his book 'The Case for Christian Nationalism' (Canon Press, 2022). Wolfe is an independent author and podcaster based in North Carolina. He draws much of his inspiration from 16th and 17th Reformed scholastic and political theology, especially the natural law framework of Johannes Althusius (1563-1638) to, in his words, “reinvigorate Christendom in the West.”
Clapp summarizes Wolfe’s vision as follows:
• that Congress declare America a Christian nation
• that Jews, Muslims, and other non-Christians not be allowed as lawmakers;
• that women be subordinated in the home, church, and government;
• that a great man will restore Christendom;
• that natural law, as he understands it, should rule;
• that Christians today are living under a secular imperialism and captivity; and
• that Christian nationalists should be willing to kill to institute their vision of America’s divinely-bestowed manifest destiny.
Clapp’s alternative vision is intriguing. It involves anarchy, friendship, and resonance. He urges Christian churches to become “prefigurative” communities, embodying a public presence that involves the “deliberate experimental implementation of desired future social relations and practices in the here-and-now.” (p.42) This involves, for the church, a willingness to live “out of control” in the sense that it co-exists with and honours pluralism and secularity. It involves a church that learns the persuasive, humble, and patient ways of our Creator revealed in Jesus, the Christ. In that way of missioning, we are inspired and instructed by the Spirit. Thus, we will “find our place in [the Bible’s] grand, all-encompassing story.” (p.25)
Anarchy, for Clapp, is an approach to engagement with the world that recognizes that the good – human freedom and dignity – in any worldly situation is but a prefiguring of the final consummation of the Kingdom of God, though that Kingdom is already at work among us and within us. He composes his version of the anarchistic tendencies that would best suit a faithful, wise, and effective witness for the church in conversation with these theologians:
• Jacques Ellul, a French Reformed teacher and writer whose most influential work warned of the control being imposed by technology;
• Davor Dzalto, an Orthodox theologian of Bosnian-Herzegovinian origin currently teaching in Stockholm, who advocates contextual fighting against oppressive power structures in any realm of human life, especially through music and medicine;
• Karl Barth, perhaps the most influential theological in the West in the 20th century;
• Vernard Eller, an American Brethren theologian and pacifist, who criticized worldy politics as resting on “a quite unfounded confidence in the moral competence of human beings” and encouraged the church to live “nonimpositionally.” (p.73); and
• Mark Eric Dyson, a Baptist minister who teaches at Vanderbilt, who saw Black theologians in the civil rights movement translating their Christian language into “a public, civic piety … love’s public language, equality in its tone of voice, and freedom its constant pitch.” (p.84)
The anarchist tendencies that Clapp draws from these conversations are composed to encourage the church to “live out of control in the sense of not lording it over others, and in the sense of not living under the control of others.” (p.85)
Friendships, especially as understood by Gary Chartier in Understanding Friendship: On the Moral, Political, and Spiritual Meaning of Love (Fortress, 2022), are for Clapp “a school for living out of control.” (p.102) Friendships, including and especially our friendship with God, are gifts to be received and appreciated. We cannot control them, but we can be redeemed through them.
Resonance, especially as understood by Hartmut Rosa in Resonance: A Sociology of Our Relationship to the World (Polity, 2019), refers to the dynamics of friendship that enhance and expand the positive results that emerge in ways that are out of the control of any individual involved in the relationships. We can’t fabricate or force it. We can only be more or less open to its gifts. Such resonate relationships amplify the flourishing of justice and peace.
Clapp promised his readers he would offer a different way of comprehending the missioning of the church in our day, a way that draws on the experience of the faith communities of the bible, communities that were not in control of politics or culture, but were able to respond faithfully in their contexts, develop an intriguing Christian anarchism, find resonance within themselves and with the world, and offer friendships in lonely and desperate societies. He has done so very well in this inspiring and instructive book.
There are many provocative insights that cannot be summarized in a review. I encourage you to read the book, immerse yourselves in the conversations, and be uplifted for your missioning.
March 5, 2025
An incredibly significant book for our time!
In this heartbreaking time of division when many are questioning their faith, Rodney Clapp provides a moving and convincing argument for living lives governed by Christian values. He documents how Christians throughout history have, despite governmental suppression and political moral failure, moved forward in faith and witness. BRAVO!!
In this heartbreaking time of division when many are questioning their faith, Rodney Clapp provides a moving and convincing argument for living lives governed by Christian values. He documents how Christians throughout history have, despite governmental suppression and political moral failure, moved forward in faith and witness. BRAVO!!
March 13, 2026
Certainly persuasive. I particularly appreciated the last chapter and the discussion of resonance.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews