In his post Phil Johnson begins with:

Some random but loosely-connected thoughts about the Fad-Driven Church® have been accumulating in my subconscious while I’ve been reposting those old entries about evangelical fads. So I’ve decided to interrupt the process of reposting old entries and take a load off my mind today…

Why is it that those who seem to talk most about originality are always so lemminglike? Take Erwin Raphael McManus, for instance. (Is there anyone more pretentious in all the world of postmodern religion?)… I confess I do not understand the near-reverential respect McManus’s admirers lavish on him. Sure, if you read his own PR about himself, you might think he is the most wonderfully creative and forward-thinking guy ever to grace a platform. But I can’t think of a single idea he has proposed that is not somehow adapted from the standard seeker-sensitive repertoire, cherry-picked from Emerging postmodernism, or purloined from some neo-gnostic playbook. Can you? (Online source)

No, Apprising Ministries is in total agreement here as it regards Emerging Church “cultural architect” and “distinguised furturist” Erwin McManus. As I pointed out in a comment today at Pyromaniacs:

Some might find this to be of interest concerning Erwin McManus. I have a source who was one of the people in the Terra Nova Project back in 1997 where Doug Pagitt was asked by Leadership Network to bring together 10 youth pastors and youth ministers who were trying to reach a “postmodern” culture.

From that TP the emerging church movement would extend with perhaps its largest and most influential branch being Emergent Village. This source told me that Erwin McManus was originally selected to be a part of TP. However, McManus was dropped very early on from further [consideration], not for theological reasons, but for personality conflicts with some of the others.

You can read Johnson’s insightful post in its entirety here.

See also: SBC PASTOR OR HUMAN POTENTIAL ADVOCATE?

ERWIN MCMANUS’ REAL POSITION ON THE AUTHORITY OF SCRIPTURE

ERWIN MCMANUS: THE PROCESS OF BECOMING

MOSAIC: EMERGENT FRUIT FROM ERWIN MCMANUS