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April 9, 2005
In Search Of...
I'm not surprised about the talk of the Pope's death but I've heard a number of things that made me think. First was a person that was upset that nothing was said during our worship service on Sunday. I'm not sure what would be said, I doubt anyone didn't know... The second was the idea that if the Pope didn't decay that he was a saint, and it was implied that he was not being embalmed to see this through (Yuck).
Alone, those things seemed odd to me, but when I look at the global picture and the fact that 4 million people attended the funeral I began to think these 3 things were related. Our world has a deep spiritual hunger and is looking for anything remotely spiritual to cling to.
Psychic networks, cults and others see this and profit from it, yet it seems that the Church falls short in noticing that people hunger for information and spiritual experience. Often, this "experience" is seen by church folk as hype to simply draw masses. While this indeed could be the case, it doesn't have to be. With planning, churches can use the attraction of experiences to draw people into a deeper understanding of God. They can feed their need for community while feeding their soul.
People are looking for ways to fill voids in their life, how is the Church going to respond? Unfortunately, I think we'll respond to this event much like we did 9-11. Then, people turned to the church looking for healing and received "band aid" sermons, fake platitudes, and unforgiving church members - and the Church lost a great opportunity. Unfortunately, if we haven't learned from our mistake, we're bound to repeat it.
Posted by Jesse at April 9, 2005 10:27 AM