Next time one of your congregation says they're thinking that it's hardly worth bothering to go to church, point in the direction of Lisa Colón DeLay, who calls herself a writer, artist, impromptu humorist, and spiritual formation provocateur (certainly sounds more trendy than a Spiritual Director).
She's recently written a post entitled, So, You wanna ditch your church? Top 5 Mistakes. It's not heavily theological, so it won't cause anyone to say 'that's too hard for me to understand.' It begins:
Sometimes going to church doesn’t seem worth it. For heaven’s sake, wouldn’t it be better to just have breakfast with some family or friends, and forgo irritating people, scheduling problems, overblown or petty dramas de jour, personality conflicts, politics, dodgy doctrinal positioning, and the rest of machine the local church can be? Is the Cracker Barrel growing a bit more more alluring each Sunday morning?
Seems like a no-brainer, right?
If this is kind of thing is happening for you, in your local church, maybe church shopping is around the bend? Well, wait just a minute. Here are 5 Mistakes you can make (or have made) regarding your local church.
1. Making theological judgments for what are personal preferences.
2. Mistaking the “local church” for The Bride of Christ.
3. Misunderstanding the idea of “community.”
4. Implementing a consumer approach with the spiritual and transcendent.
5. Overlooking what is happening in the sacraments.
2 comments:
I thank you for the link to my article.
"provocateur" is nice and open-ended. In our times, "Spiritual Director" is sometimes greeted with suspension, firstly.
I, personally, don't mind being called either monicker. Especially, if it could prompt a trip to beautiful N.Z.
Viva la Kiwis!
Cheers, and God bless.
Lisa DeLay
I guess 'Spiritual Director' sounds a bit formal, old-fashioned even...
I'll have to check what my Spiritual Director friend would think of changing his title to 'Spiritual Provocateur' - I have a suspicion he'd be quite impressed with the idea.
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