"The public is patently interested in things we talk about in the church," distinguished theologian Martin Marty said today before an overflow chapel audience at The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia.

"The challenge is to interpret what we have to say," said Marty. "We need to seek fresh language for a new day" and get past the "special interiority" of church language that hides its meaning from the public.

Marty, who directs The Public Religion Project funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts, called for the public church to have a "mission of clarity" to shape the public language it espouses. "Too frequently the language of scholars on the front edge of the church's thinking doesn't match the language that is out there. We need the kind of language that reaches a depth of heart in that place where the infidel moves…"

Marty was the lead keynoter in the Seminary's Shearer Symposium Fall Lecture Series. The Public Religion Project has a mission "to promote efforts to bring to light and interpret the forces of faith within a pluralistic society." A Lutheran, Marty is the Fairfax M. Cone Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Chicago. The lecture series has the theme, "The Public Church -- Living Out the Good News."

Such language finds ways to "bring out the interestingness that is latent in people," Marty says. Such storytelling gives definition to words familiar in religious circles, such as vocation, responsibility, mission and covenant. He said effective use of such language is something the church is capable of doing well. Techniques for making such public messages effective will probably "border on the conventional and unconventional", he said.

"Volunteers are probably the great untold story of the church," he noted. "These stories are not of conflict, but of healing. "They are the stories of addiction centers, day care and night care. When local churches appear in a feature, rather than the news, then the story of the church emerges in language that people want to hear. Let that side of the church show through," Marty told the hundreds on hand, including parish pastors, seminary alumni, lay leaders and students. But he was careful to say that the media wasn't the only, or even the most significant outlet for the public church.

Other Marty highlights that made up his address or comments later on during his visit:

• Adult forums in congregations would appeal more to people if they dealt more with how the Gospel "has the power to interrupt their lives, right where they are."
• Congregations, especially larger ones, need to work harder on bringing adults together with like professional backgrounds in support group situations.
• Getting value out of the internet is a problem "unless you are capable of generating strong values on your own. Screening the internet is a problem." A similar challenge exists regarding television. Commenting about his prior evening in a Philadelphia hotel, Marty referenced a tour through 74 channels on cable. "Many good things are there," he said, "but you have to work so hard to get through them."
• Marty described discussions of the Concordat of Agreement in discussion between Lutherans and Episcopalians as exemplary of "interiority" of language. "We need to be clear, unambiguous and without footnotes."
• He told the Seminary faculty the Bible "is still the book." The challenge is to get it out to the public in a "fresh way as story" without homogenizing it and maintaining its meaning to a culture that is not homogeneous.
• Marty told the faculty he is wary of a popular notion of spirituality that is "generalized…equidistant from every tradition." For spirituality to have meaning requires it to be "moored" to a specific text and community.
• What many say today about the dehumanizing impact of technology is what they once said about the telephone. Some found the early telephone depersonalizing. Others, he said, found it a way to get work done. "For some, technology is dehumanizing. For others, it is a godsend," he said.
• "Sadness" is the primary word Marty uses to define the Clinton controversy which "debases" everything it touches. "Americans aren't moral relativists. They know that adultery is wrong and that it is not a compromisable issue. They know that lying is wrong. " He said he believes that the public doesn't want to let the President off the hook, but he said he thinks the public is not as indignant as many in the media or political arenas "because people have their lives to live, and they do not see the President's behavior as a template for their lives."