It has been 6 months or so since the kids and I started attending a nearby Christian church (where the kids have gone to preschool). My "goal" was to attend once a month, not enough for me to get burnt out but enough for the kids to become familiar with the children's worship program with the intention of sending them to vacation bible school this summer.
(I did not like the idea of just sending them to VBS without somewhat regularly attending church services. It seemed a little weird for me to allow people I've never met or even seen before to hang with the kids, and despite theoretically liking the idea of free childcare, I don't really like the idea of free child care.)
Our daily lives have not changed with our church attendance. I am not reading the Bible or praying or anything of that sort. But I have found that when we haven't gone to service after a few weeks I find myself wanting to return. I enjoy the sermons very much.....maybe only because it gives me other things to think about besides the "usual" things that run amok in my brain.
If there is anything I haven't liked about the church it hasn't been enough to make me angry or uncomfortable, and that is saying a lot because it doesn't take much to do those things especially when it comes to religion or spirituality.
Yesterday's service had the woman who did the music taking the minister's place when they were saying prayers over the bread and juice, which I found pleasantly shocking given my childhood and early adult years in the Catholic Church. It was like turning the entire patriarchal system on its duff having a woman in the center of the "apostles" as it were.
N and G enjoy the children's worship, and I have gotten compliments about how well-behaved they are. M will start joining them in the fall when he turns 4.
I am very much an inactive participant. Just sitting my butt in that pew is my signal that I am open to hearing, to learning. As much as I like to write and express in every other facet of my life, I am almost freakishly reserved when it comes to church proper. I'm not sure what this means or signifies, if anything.
Sometimes I wonder if I have put up a large wall and am just waiting for god/higher power/whatever to bust it down in some miraculous fashion. But the worship leader yesterday made a point about pentecost that appealed to me by referencing his father's love, which was shown in small, seemingly insignificant ways that over the long-term were an indisputable sign that was very, very powerful to him and his siblings.
Even if I do have a wall up, I suspect I would be frightened the hell off if it were busted down in one big show of power.
I think small, gentle chinks are the way it will fall.
If there is a wall.
And if it can be breached.
(I did not like the idea of just sending them to VBS without somewhat regularly attending church services. It seemed a little weird for me to allow people I've never met or even seen before to hang with the kids, and despite theoretically liking the idea of free childcare, I don't really like the idea of free child care.)
Our daily lives have not changed with our church attendance. I am not reading the Bible or praying or anything of that sort. But I have found that when we haven't gone to service after a few weeks I find myself wanting to return. I enjoy the sermons very much.....maybe only because it gives me other things to think about besides the "usual" things that run amok in my brain.
If there is anything I haven't liked about the church it hasn't been enough to make me angry or uncomfortable, and that is saying a lot because it doesn't take much to do those things especially when it comes to religion or spirituality.
Yesterday's service had the woman who did the music taking the minister's place when they were saying prayers over the bread and juice, which I found pleasantly shocking given my childhood and early adult years in the Catholic Church. It was like turning the entire patriarchal system on its duff having a woman in the center of the "apostles" as it were.
N and G enjoy the children's worship, and I have gotten compliments about how well-behaved they are. M will start joining them in the fall when he turns 4.
I am very much an inactive participant. Just sitting my butt in that pew is my signal that I am open to hearing, to learning. As much as I like to write and express in every other facet of my life, I am almost freakishly reserved when it comes to church proper. I'm not sure what this means or signifies, if anything.
Sometimes I wonder if I have put up a large wall and am just waiting for god/higher power/whatever to bust it down in some miraculous fashion. But the worship leader yesterday made a point about pentecost that appealed to me by referencing his father's love, which was shown in small, seemingly insignificant ways that over the long-term were an indisputable sign that was very, very powerful to him and his siblings.
Even if I do have a wall up, I suspect I would be frightened the hell off if it were busted down in one big show of power.
I think small, gentle chinks are the way it will fall.
If there is a wall.
And if it can be breached.
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