On Why I Go to Church, Part I

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Creator of Heaven and Earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilot, was crucified, died, and was buried; he descended into Hell. The third day He rose again from the dead. He ascended in to Heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty. From thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in a Holy Catholic Church, the communion of Saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the Body, and the Life everlasting. Amen. In case you haven’t noticed yet, i have been raised in the Christian Church, and am myself a confessing believer. These posts concern my motivations, not for my conversion, but for my involvement in the institution of the Church. It is written more for my own satisfaction than anything else, so if rather incoherent introspection does not interest you, i recommend that you skip them.

Some months ago, my grandmother asked me why i attend the particular church that i do. She had heard some people complaining about its lack of a pastor (we just got one this month after over two years). It is a more traditional church, though not particularly conservative, and there is not much geared towards “young people.” Although there are several reasons, i could not give her an articulate answer. The truth is, i still can’t, but i had to try.

The first question is, of course, why go to church at all. Let me start by giving you a (hopefully) short history of my involvement with the church. My father is a pastor. My mother’s father is a pastor. My father’s uncle is a pastor. My father’s father’s father was a pastor. My father’s second cousin is a pastor. All of them are in the same, rather small denomination.

However, my father was also in the Navy. For many years we had not the luxury of a church in our denomination (which is a rather small branch of the Holy Catholic Church - it is often said that the Jehovah's Witnesses know that only 144,000 people will be saved, and we know who they are. Not particularly funny perhaps, but this denomination is known for its stolid respectability and emphasis on academics, not for its great wit). My family is of a very Reformed (Calvinist) background, but my best friends were Catholic, Mormon, or Agnostic. We discussed our various faiths with each other in much the same way we discussed our various tastes in food and clothing - with curiosity and politeness, and a complacent certainty that it was our family who were "right."

And so it is perhaps not completely presumptuous to say that i have had a good deal of experience with churches of all shapes and sizes. I have attended a rural church whose congregation met in a small Northern town (population 20), where they seemed to have only two surnames to choose from. I have attended an American chapel on a military base in a foreign country, as well as services in Spanish, Italian, Latin, and Dutch. I have attended Roman Catholic, Mormon, Baptist, Gospel, Presbyterian, Reformed, and Non-denominational services. I have participated in services performed at a megachurch (which was attached to the school i attended at the time), at a moderately sized church in drained swampland of the rural south, at a small church in a huge metropolitan area, and I am starting to sound like Dr. Seuss.

The two stereotypical reactions to this upbringing are prim purity and self-righteous rebellion. Fortunately my parents were always fairly balanced, and so was my reaction. Being a PK (pastor’s kid), i was privileged to see what goes on behind the scene. I was fortunate enough to know of all the petty squabbling and back-stabbing, the snubs and the cliques. Though my cynicism was necessarily restrained in public, given my family’s position, i had a difficult time believing good of any church and gave my parents rather a hard time. I swore i would not attend church once i left the house.

Each denomination, each individual church, believes itself to have all the answers. Each individual in the congregation expects the pastor to be their exact ideal of perfection, and when he isn’t they feel betrayed. The pastor thinks of himself as the most important person there (always, of course, excepting my father), and believes that the congregation is going against the word of the Lord when he doesn’t get his every desire. Sunday School for the younger children is entirely about the various wives’ power plays. The older children are taught by people trying desperately to be hip and coming across as even more juvenile than the students. There also seems to be a prevailing belief among youth workers that sexual promiscuity and drug abuse are the only issues anyone over 13 ever thinks about. The lessons were obvious, thoughtless, clichéd, and sometimes just plain wrong. The music is either by some pathetic garage band who has taken all of the poetry out of the lyrics, or by a choir who faints with shock if any song younger than their geriatric director is sung. Church is, at best, totally and completely irrelevant. The phrase “Catholic Church” is the height of irony, the best of oxymorons.

Part II