“Generation X and the Millennials are fed up with the disputes that define American church today. They want to talk about the Gospels; what Jesus taught and did.”

Philip Clayton, a theologian at Claremont School of Theology in Claremont, Calif., is among a group of theologians eager to move beyond the culture wars that have pitted the Christian right and left for so long…calling attention to the way Christianity has become bitterly polarized.

That polarization is turn-off to a younger generation not as invested in the old battles.

At a conference Wednesday and Thursday in Raleigh, North Carolina, Clayton and an impressive group of contemporary Christian thinkers will consider whether the gulf between the two Christian worlds can be bridged. Called “Big Tent Christianity,” the conference is an attempt to rethink what it means to be a Christian in the 21st century.

Funded with a Ford Foundation grant, the two-day event will bring popular speakers such as Brian McLaren and Shane Claiborne to talk to ministers, scholars, students and lay leaders. The two dozen speakers will also be gathering for a private session at a conference center in Durham.

The genesis of the conference is a new movement in American Christianity called “emergent” or “emergence.” Its followers consist of people in their 20s, 30s and early 40s who are far more willing to ask respectful questions of their faith and grapple with new interpretations.

Read more: http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/09/06/667013/big-tent-conference-in-raleigh.html#ixzz0yl7NmPSg

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