I am not going to give my opinion right now. I am sitting in the St. Louis airport waiting to board a plane and I was reading my responses to a previous post. I have decided to see if I can get some answers from some of you.
My question is simply this: if you don't go to church, why? I'm not asking why you don't go to my church or a certain church in your town, but why don't you go at all? Do you not believe in God, do you not believe in organized religion...what is your reason? You can answer and not give your name, that is fine. The only reason I gave those two possible reasons above was because those are answers I have been given in person when I asked this question.
Please take a moment and answer my question. I really want to know. :) I am not going to combat your answers or come against your logic in any way. I am truly curious.
Thank you for taking the time to read this far and I appreciate any and all feedback.
2 comments:
Since you asked in a very non-threatening way...(hehe) I will tell you.
When I was young, I did the whole "Victory/Rhema" thing...go to church all the time, hang out with my church homies, etc. This happened up until I moved to Alaska. I was 12, and the entire experience was eye-opening to me. I found myself talking to people, and relating to them without having to delve into a religious conversation. The people "up there" are very private about their religious beliefs, but they actually hold them sacred. They feel that us "down here" flaunt our beliefs yet never practice what we preach. I thought it was very profound.
Since then, I've taken my relationship with God more seriously. Back then, it was about going to church and now it is about having that relationship with God. God's house is everywhere...I just find a quiet place and time to commune with him. I'm not "religious" about my times with him currently, but I'm getting better. I do talk to him every day...to me, that's important. He is my father, and I want to talk to him as much as I talk to my mother...personally, I'd prefer to talk to him over my mother...I digress.
I DO like the idea of church. I just have not found a home. And as I told my friend the other day, I want to find a home on my own...without being dragged in to see their version of "home." I've gone with the crowd way too long, and I'm way to intelligent just to settle for some mediocre teachings...I need the meat and potatoes. Unfortunately, I haven't found it here. I do go occasionally, and I like to jump around...hear new teachings, new ideas...
That's my answer. Again, I feel the relationship is better than the routine. I've been burned by the institution of church before. My relationship with God is sacred, and I don't trust it in anyone's hands but his. I want to go where I feel safe to commune with him openly without judgments or other craziness...I'm my most vulnerable then.
Wow...you asked for it...this is a novel! Okay, check ya later!
Interesting article:
Saying no to Sundays
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Clock 25. March 2009 by Tom Ehrich, Religion News Service
For five decades and in growing numbers, American Christians have been saying no to Sunday church. I think it is time we listened.
We have labeled them “unchurched,” “nonbelievers,” “former Christians,” “happy pagans,” “lost,” and a “mission field” that’s “ripe for harvest.” These negative terms imply that the absent have a flaw that needs to be addressed.
New congregations have harvested some of these former mainline Protestant and Roman Catholic churchgoers. But even their numbers rise and fall — especially when the founding pastor slips up or retires, and the overall trend in church participation remains down. In some Western states, Sunday churchgoing has fallen below 10 percent of the population.
When this slide commenced in 1964 as baby boomers began graduating from high school, many church leaders didn’t even acknowledge it. For years, they kept counting the absent as present. Then, when the losses couldn’t be ignored, they blamed them on whatever hot-button issues were roiling the religious establishment, as if new liturgies, women in leadership, and liberals (or conservatives, take your pick) had driven people away.
We need to see that these “formers” aren’t saying no to God, or to their Christian identity, or to their yearning for faith. Many are simply saying no to Sunday church.
They are expressing a preference for something other than getting up early on Sunday, driving across town, sitting in a pew for an hour or more, making small talk with people they don’t really know, and driving home again.
They are saying no to Sunday, the only day they can get a slow start in this everyone-works-hard era.
They are saying no to being an audience in an age of participation and self-determination.
They are saying no to institutional preaching, repetitive liturgies, and assemblies controlled by small cadres usually older than themselves.
They are saying no to being told what to believe.
They are saying no to having their questions ignored.
Instead, they find spiritual enrichment on the Internet and on television. They read faith-related books. They pray on their own. They find their own networks of faithful friends.
The problem isn’t their faith. The problem is Christianity’s delivery system. We are stuck in trying to lure people to physical locations at a time of our choosing, to do what we think they ought to do, and to be loyal in paying for it. It is time we looked beyond the
paradigm of Sunday church.
I think the future lies in “multichanneling’’: a combination of on-site, online, workplace and at-home offerings that create networks of self-determining constituents, many of whom might never attend Sunday church.
The first challenge, however, is to recognize how deeply wedded we are to Sunday on-site participation as the only true expression and measure of faithfulness. Almost everything about our institutions — facilities, ordination training, staffing, budgeting — aims to draw people to a central location on Sunday.
We need to see that what works for some doesn’t work for others. Not because the others are flawed, nor because our culture has collapsed and turned against God, but because things change. Just as Jesus took his ministry out of the synagogue and radically rethought the meaning of Sabbath, so God is drawing us away from “former things,” even ones we treasure and consider our duty.
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