I seem
to meet an increasing number of people who insist on telling me that they are
as good a person as those who attend public worship week by week, even if they
never set foot inside a church building on a regular basis – I’m
sure they are! They are a growing number who feel they "believe, but do not
belong."
There
is a wonderful story about a couple leaving church after morning worship and
the wife asking her husband if he had noticed a hat worn by a particular person
and an awful hairdo which another parishioner was displaying!
The
husband replied that he had not really noticed either – his wife said, rather
impatiently, "John, I sometimes wonder if you get anything at all out of going
to church!"
Luke,
early on in his Gospel, tells us that Jesus, when he returned to Galilee, went
up to his home town Nazareth and on the Sabbath Day went into the synagogue, as
was his custom.
We are
called, in our time, to live out the Good News, to keep the Good News alive in
the world today, by sharing the life of Christ and so being a living presence
of his love wherever we find ourselves. Regular worship for us all, as a
community, through word and sacrament are central to the Christian experience.
Jesus
grew up in faith attending the synagogue in his home town and the story of the
couple leaving church after morning worship reminds us that different people
will have different experiences of going to church, depending upon what their
expectations are of worship, and of course their participation as members of
the Body of Christ.
Michael
To make mistakes is human, to blame them on
someone else shows management potential!
