I hesitate. Do I really want to answer? Finally, I blurt it out: “Religion. I write about religion.”

My seat companion looks askance—almost as if he is sitting next to some sort of fanatic. He obviously worries that I will spend our cross-country flight trying to convince him to accept Jesus in his heart, join an evangelical megachurch, vote for a local religious right candidate, or that the world was created in six 24-hour days. I quickly add, “Not that sort of religion. I don’t write about narrow, right-wing religion.” He looks relieved. “I write about mainstream and progressive Christianity—churches that base their message on God’s love for all people and God’s vision of peace and justice for the world.”

Now he appears genuinely interested. “There are churches like that?” “Yes,” I assure him, “there are lots of churches like that.”

Although many people have not yet noticed, there is a quiet revival going on in American religion in its least likely quarters—among moderate and liberal “brand name” Christian congregations, folks like the Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Congregationalists, Lutherans, Methodists, the American and Cooperative Baptists, in peace churches like the Quakers and Mennonites, and in independent and alternative Christian communities gathering around the “new monasticism ” or “emergent village .” These Christians practice their faith with renewed enthusiasm, are experimenting with new forms of worship and service, and are, by their insistence on friendship, justice, and diversity, reforming the structures and traditions in which they find themselves. They are NOT the religious right. And, frankly, they do not like the fact that the media depicts most—if not all—American Christians as card-carrying members of suburban megachurches and Focus on the Family.

But they are not exactly a religious left, either. There is a religious left, and a rather vigorous one at that. I’m talking about something slightly different—Christians and churches that are something else—a new, generous, practicing sort of postmodern Christianity, a kind of Christianity that is embracing and redefining tradition while enacting justice in the world—people and communities that escape easy characterization or precise definition.

I know about this quiet revival for two reasons. First, I’ve been part of it for the better part of my adult life. I am the kind of Christian I’ve described above. And second, for the last dozen years, I’ve been studying it. Trying to figure out, to understand if there is any sort of spiritual pattern to seemingly episodic reports of renewal, following threads of new vitality across the nation. And, after research and writing, I can say with great confidence that something new is happening in American religion, all across the country, people with a similar vision of practicing faith in community, of re-engaging tradition, and seeking wisdom is coming into focus. This kind of Christianity stands outside that old “right-left” divide of American religion and is trying to create a new theological language, new structures of leadership and community, and a responsible, peace-filled, and just global Christian (and Jewish and Muslim and Buddhist, etc…) vision.

It doesn’t really have a name yet—although most people seem to be calling it “emerging,” “practicing,” “transformative,” “missional,” or “progressive” Christianity. People trying to describe it use these names somewhat interchangeably but are speaking of different aspects of the same phenomenon. I simply refer to it as “Christianity for the rest of us,” a way of saying that this generous-sort of faith has its arms wide-open. It needs no name—for any single name could become a party-label—because it is a disposition of faithful people on a different kind of journey, a journey with friends toward some undiscovered country of being God’s new community.

That’s what I write about: Christianity for the rest of us. For those who are tired, bored, dissatisfied with “business-as-usual” faith and are doing—or want to do—something about it—forming new communities, dreaming new theological visions, embracing new spiritual practices, reaching out and making new friends across old boundaries, speaking new faith language, and striving to enact God’s justice in our lives, our congregations, and our world.