If You Don't Go to Church Then You are Going To...

Down with church-shopping!

I say this for a couple of reasons. First, it just doesn’t do well for my self-esteem. I feel much better about myself when people visit my church and then stay there. You don’t need to go elsewhere, I have everything you need right here, so why keep looking? I guess it is ok when people leave other churches to check out my church, but otherwise I am against it.

Heh

A more serious reason why we need to be careful with church shopping and poor attendance is that when people jump from church to church they never become a part of a community. If someone is not a consistent part of a community than that person does not learn the values and virtues (and theology) of that community. That individual will not grow.

I have recently been engaged in a “conversation” on Facebook with a whole bunch of Baptist pastors concerning style and aesthetics of worship vs. theology of worship. Obviously a stodgy individual like myself will be for theology over anything fun, beautiful, or moving.

As I have been following the conversation and offering my humble thoughts from time to time I have noticed a theme suggesting the notion that in a well thought-out and crafted service the theology will be implicit. One need not lecture theological doctrine or force people to memorize creeds. The people worshipping will embrace the theology of the community, probably unknowingly, and will live out that theology.

I’m still plowing through MacIntyre’s After Virtue and just read the following statement which is apropos:

…morality is always to some degree tied to the socially local and particular and that the aspiration of the morality of modernity to a universality freed from all particularity is an illusion; and second that there is no way to possess the virtues except as part of a tradition in which we inherit them… (third edition, 126-127)

So here is the kicker. If we are not a consistent part of a local tradition, engaged in the practices on a regular basis, then we will not know or understand the morality/theology of that community. To shop around, or have spotty attendance is a decidedly a-theological move that will lead to an atrophy of faith. Yes, people will enjoy the spectacle of worship from time to time, but the grammar of the community/faith will never be learned.

So go to church, damnit! Preferably mine, but if you must, find some other one, make a commitment, and try to get there on a regular basis. Unless, of course, you are happy with your less then mediocre relationship with Christ.