A Good Word for the Local Church – An Apologetic but not an Apology
I guess I have grown tired of the continual articles about faith is good – organized religion is bad journalistic efforts. It seems that an increasing number of people who say they hold to a faith-based perspective on life are offering demonstrative critiques of organized religion as found in the institutional church. Church bashing is increasingly in vogue. While in my lengthy journey as an ordained minister serving for over 35 years in local churches I have seen some of the “less-than-Christian” behavior that the faith-without-religion critics are using as their thesis for being “unaffiliated.” I feel I still need to offer a good word for organized religion’s basic unit of operation. It has been my contention all along that the church doesn’t receive the immense credit it deserves for its role in society – in the past and in the present. So I offer an apologetic for the church without apology.
The local church is the place where unique and diverse community is encouraged and fostered. While many churches lack racial-ethnic diversity as we define it today, it is still the place where young children, inquisitive teenagers, young and middle aged parents, singles and couples, and seasoned citizens meet and greet and share their life stories. It is the place where seeking souls from across the economic spectrum sit side by side in the worship of the One who tears down the dividing walls. It is increasingly the place where people of different racial, cultural, and sexual preference backgrounds study the Word together and work for the social welfare of the greatest in need together. There are very few places in our society where people of different ages, economic circumstances, and racial and cultural backgrounds gather. Very few other organizations and institutions bring such divergent people together in search of the meaning of life. Not even the educational system – particularly around age diversity – can claim to be the place for building community.
The local church is the place where preventative holistic healthcare is always available. Whether it is the wisdom shared about living a fulfilling life from words spoken from a pulpit or a sharing of life’s trials with someone at a fellowship hour or in a pastor’s office or the community support in a time of illness or bereavement, the church is a primary healthcare provider. I cannot imagine how many times I have seen a word spoken, an embrace offered, and a counseling insight shared where some form of emotional, spiritual, or relational healing has taken place. Visiting the sick; communicating with the lonely; welcoming with equal love and care each person regardless of their status in the world’s eyes; offering a space and a place for organizations that bring wholeness to the addicted and conflicted, that is the essence of the local church I experienced. Maybe the problem is that all of this is done through simple acts of goodness that bring no fanfare.
The local church is a place that calls us to remember and to serve those in greatest need in the wider world. While attending to the well being of its community, it also challenges those who dare to hear the Gospel call to think globally and to offer not just heart but hands in service to those in greatest need. It offers hands on opportunities to experience the realities of the wider world and to work for changing the forces in the world that cause oppression and division in the global community. It is a place that comforts our hurting souls and disquiets us from becoming too comfortable in a world where so many suffer. The church (particularly my United Church of Christ) has historically been the catalyst for societal action in the areas of quality education, racial and ethnic discrimination, women’s and sexual preference equality and rights, quality healthcare delivery, and so much more in the area of human service providing. Again the church goes about its outreach and justice ministries seeking little public recognition.
The local church is a place where eternal values are taught. While some would be fair in their critique of the church occasionally becoming involved in theological trivia and strident judgmentalism on some issues that Jesus himself would concede as unimportant, the church does offer a constant reminder of the values that are important for the salvation of our souls and the world. I once told a parishioner who asked about the many facets of my “job” on Sunday mornings that I have the role to remind all who will hear, including myself, of those things – compassion, grace, forgiveness, kindness, patience, humility – that make for a truly good and blessed life. All of us need a refresher course in holy living on a regular basis and the church provides that values education.
And maybe the complaint by many faith-without-church advocates “that the church is filled with hypocrites” is yet another reason why the church is so valuable and essential. We need a place in the world that offers grace and calls for repentance. In remembering the church in which I grew up I recalled the funeral of one older member who constantly complained about almost everything the church did and supported. Yet, at his funeral the pastor while acknowledging some of the man’s shortcomings said that he had been a good man and a child of God. Maybe the church’s major gift to the world is to welcome soiled and broken souls – probably in some way all of us – with a word of grace and, when necessary, a loving call for repentance. In my ministry I have felt that it was my role to try to seek the God-ness and the good inside of the most cantankerous and mystifying souls who crossed my path. The church is a place of grace and grace again. Where else is such compassion offered?
Maybe the faith without church advocates don’t want to have their opinions challenged or shallow holy moments tested. Maybe it is the “other-centered-ness” of the church that keeps those seeking individual salvation from entering into Christian community. I have a personal belief that in our attention deficit, “myself first” world that many critiques of the institutional church have not given participation in a community of faith a fair chance. Yes, the church must always be seeking to be relevant in every age, but also those desiring the benefits that the local church offers must take the time to dig into the life-enhancing realities that being part of a true community of soiled-saints has to offer. It is time that the “churched” speak out without apology about the blessings of being part of that community of seeking souls that is call the local church.
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