Homogenous Unit Principle: Time for a Rethink?

I have been rethinking the value of Homogenous Unit Principle (HUP) based mission strategies over the last few months, and particularly over the last few weeks, and think its maybe time I started letting this cat out of the bag.

It has more than a little to do with my shift towards deeper local church involvement.

Here is an article which highlights some of the issues that concern me:

Rethinking HUP thinking: Confessions of a Homogeneous Unit Principle Advocate

Basically I have come to question how transferable the Homogenous Unit Principle is to pluralistic western contexts, particularly given the fluidity of our society. Once upon a time I thought sub-culturally contextualized groups were the way to go; that overseas mission methodologies were fully transferable. But over time I have been forced to concede that our subcultures just aren't homogenous enough. It's extreme diversity all the way down with the most pluralistic of the pluralists. There is no homogenous unit, not even at the level of the individual, not when plurality becomes internalized.

So maybe its time to give up experimenting with homogenous-translocal groups; maybe its time to re-examine the possibilities of hetrogenous-local groups; to shift from demographic focus back to geographic focus. Is that incarnational-mission heresy? Does that smack of a return to one-size-fits-all for some of you? I don't know how you might interpret this to be honest, but that's the way I've been shifting of late. Essentially, I believe we need models that respect multiple diversities, extreme diversities even. That's not sub-culturally contextual church, but its not Christendom church either. It's something else.