I was visiting a corps 'up north' recently (no names, no pack drill). Standing outside, I was looking at the notices at the front of the hall. The first thing I noticed was how nicely made they were - I hate poorly produced posters. Note only were they well produced, they were themed 'we are the church that listens'. Matching format - so far, so good.
The first poster said, 'you told us that you wanted parent and toddlers even during the holidays. We listened - we now run parent and toddlers even through the holidays'. Wow, commitment to meeting needs. Still good, I thought.
The next poster said 'you told us that Sundays are a busy day. We listened - so we now have worship every fortnight'. WHAT!!!!! I suddenly went into my Victor Meldrew mode - I called Lyn to loook whilst doing my, 'I don't believe it!' routine.
Am I really turning into a grumpy old man, or what? Now I'm all for valuing family time. The old days of 3 meetings and 2 Sunday Schools every Sunday now seem like a form of torture. But worship every fortnight! Do I assume that Parent and Toddlers are more important than Sunday worship? And we wonder why the church is declining! I'd be interested in your comments - let me know what you think.
2 comments:
I can't believe that either! What? If Sundays are busy the response is surely not, "well lets just come every other week then"?!?!?! Why not have a worship session during the week as well for those who feel that Sunday is too busy?! That is really stupid!
Kind of reminds me of that book with the title, 'too busy not to pray...' How about, 'too busy not to go to church'?!
My eclectic role covers the P and T Groups and I would say that, run properly, P and T Groups can be as important as Sunday Worship. I guess the question to ask is - what else goes on during the week? Do they have House Groups maybe. My 'don't believe it'would be if the band and songsters still had a two hour practise a week, but the Corps only had corporate Worship every other week - now that would rattle me mighitly.
Mentioned your blog in my blog this week by the way :)
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