Categories: uncategorized
Date: 10 June 2007 09:52:42
Tractor Girl ruminates on ways for a church to be community. I've always been uncomfortable with the proliferation of 'special interest groups' in the church, the classic example, I suppose, being what used to be called the Women's Guild in the Church of Scotland. I can't (or daren't) comment, being for ever excluded from this particular shadowy but powerful body. I like Tractor Girl's picture of an open, free-flowing community.
Sadly, church for me is an hour a fortnight, in a congregation which doesn't even stay for coffee after the service. Our minister does drop in to see us from time to time. I'm not complaining. We made a deliberate choice to join the church which is nearest to us, which happens to have meant slotting back into a rather traditional Church of Scotland. And spending 3 hours a day commuting rather rules out attending small groups in the evenings. Wife did join a bible study group which meets in the manse, but has found it too much effort to keep going.
I know that as a two parent family, we should be able to take turns, but it seems to take both of us all of our time to maintain even a somewhat basic routine, and, of course, we need to be supporting our children in their various extramural activities.
I don't know the answer. My Christian life has become an individual effort, drawing on helpful resources such as Scripture Union and, of course, the wibSite. In some ways, my own personality may be a contributory factor; I am an introvert, and find that involvement with people drains me rather than energising me. But I sometimes wonder if the present darkness might be less dark if I could share it a bit more.