Hi everyone,
You might have heard that Cormac McCarthy passed away this week. I couldn’t call myself a fan of his, having read only one book (The Road). Knowing his reputation for violence has caused me to steer clear of the others thus far — though I feel I will probably make my way into others of his. I picked up The Road because that troublemaker Andrew Peterson recommended it once. It is not at all like my usual reading fare.
The book wrecked me in the best way possible. It is bleak, dark, and brilliant. I finished it in tears.
Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. Maps and mazes. Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery.
The Part Where There’s an Essay: Join the Institution (Part I)
Recently I’ve been exploring some “small and boring” ways to invest in your community. This series starts back here.
This past year in our poetry studies, we covered Emily Dickinson for an entire term. We love Emily, but by the end of the term, we were all ready to let her go. One poem that raised some of my kids’ eyebrows was “Some Keep the Sabbath Going to Church.” In it, Dickinson discusses how she attends church:
Some keep the Sabbath going to Church –
I keep it, staying at Home –
With a Bobolink for a Chorister –
And an Orchard, for a Dome –
She “goes to church” by heading outside and enjoying nature. Upon reading this poem, I realized that Emily could easily be a 21st-century “churchgoer.” I’ve heard many people today use the same language and idea to avoid attending church. While I agree with Emily that nature draws us nearer to the Creator who made it, and time spent outdoors can be worshipful, I do not agree that this is a proper substitute for attending your local church -- even if “God preaches, a noted Clergyman –/And the sermon is never long.”
It’s become routine for recent generations to say something like, “I’m spiritual, but not religious.” This is shorthand for “I'm not joining any religious institution.” People enjoy the enlightened status of being “in touch with their spirituality,” but they don’t want that to crowd their preferences or schedules. If they join a church, they might be required to show up for something. They might be expected to be there. This flies in the face of the prevailing individualistic mentality. Being obligated to other people is quite inconvenient on occasion. In fact, it’s inconvenient most of the time.
Land of the Free
“History began on July 4th, 1776. Everything before that was a mistake.” - Ron Swanson, Parks and Recreation
Welcome to America, where we all pursue independence and pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. We’re going to need you to manage your own problems from here on out. Please do not ask for help; Americans make their own way. We esteem the words “independence” and “freedom.” Being vulnerable and depending on other people only muddies that up. Let’s make a deal: I won’t depend on you, and you don’t depend on me.
Unfortunately, in the last two to three generations in America, this inclination towards independence has become mixed with the inclination to resist responsibility as well. It has become less about “let me be independent so that I can do what I ought, in the way that I want,” and more about “let me be independent so that I can do what I want, period.”
What has this meant for the church? It means people come through the door each Sunday, sit and listen to the sermon, and don’t invest. They pursue a church as though it is a live theatrical production to attend each week. They become consumers of the church’s goods and services. They listen to the sermon, put their children in the children’s ministries, and enjoy the atmosphere. But when the time concludes each week, they scatter to the four winds, never to be heard from again until next week.
When our staff welcomes people after the opening song, we hear the words, “welcome to this week’s gathering of our church.” This is meant to drive home the point that the church isn’t the building -- it isn’t the service -- it isn’t the location. It’s the people. The church itself is not a place to be attended. It is a living, breathing organism, made up of the people who have committed to it. When the people who attend merely check in and out on Sundays (as they would at a cultural event), the church misses out, and they miss out.
(Continued next week)
For the Anglophiles
The winner of last month’s Gloucestershire cheese roll finished after she was knocked unconscious. “Despite her blacking out, a CT scan showed Irving didn’t sustain any serious damage from her victorious tumble. She was able to walk away from Cooper’s Hill with some bruises and her grand prize of seven pounds of cheese.”
Reads & Listens of the Week
I really loved this from Mike Kruger: How to Make People Feel Seen Rather than Watched. For Christian leaders and for all of us — three diagnostic questions follow.
Though I have never been there, I cried the day that Notre Dame Cathedral burned. Something about the loss of something so sacred and so old felt profoundly disruptive to me. Here’s a lovely update about the progress on raising the spire again.
One of the challenges of trying to minimize smartphone usage with teens is the way that school and social groups tend to demand the usage of the devices. I would love to see groups be more creative about this. Here’s one mom’s lament along those lines.
If I had to name two men who disciple the men in my church more than any others, it would be non-Christians Jordan Peterson and Joe Rogan. This became especially apparent during the pandemic. Here’s a challenge to them both, and others like them. “It’s a vision that resembles Christianity sufficiently to take hold of young believers’ hearts and minds, without them noticing it’s actually a syncretistic distortion.”
Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden. ― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
“Welcome to this week’s gathering of our church” - love that.
You’re putting words to thoughts I’ve been pondering about the vital purpose of a local church in all its imperfections. We got to our home church today after two week’s absence, and I remembered again what keeps bringing me back despite the various and sundry issues we’re falteringly working through: 1) the people--they’re family, 2) the corporate worship; voices raised and ears alert and the Spirit moving.