In a column at EthicsDaily.com, Barry Howard shares what Teddy Roosevelt said on the subject in a 1917 article in Ladies Home Journal. According to Howard, here are President Rooselvelt's reasons:
1. In the actual world a churchless community, a community where men have abandoned and scoffed at or ignored their religious needs, is a community on the rapid downgrade.
2. Church work and church attendance mean the cultivation of the habit of feeling some responsibility for others and the sense of braced moral strength, which prevents a relaxation of one's own moral fiber.
3. There are enough holidays for most of us that can quite properly be devoted to pure holiday making. Sundays differ from other holidays, among other ways, in the fact that there are 52 of them every year. On Sunday, go to church.
4. Yes, I know all the excuses. I know that one can worship the Creator and dedicate oneself to good living in a grove of trees, or by a running brook, or in one's own house, just as well as in church. But I also know as a matter of cold fact the average man does not thus worship or thus dedicate himself. If he strays away from church, he does not spend his time in good works or lofty meditation. He looks over the colored supplement of the newspaper.
5. He may not hear a good sermon at church. But unless he is very unfortunate, he will hear a sermon by a good man who, with his good wife, is engaged all the week long in a series of wearing, humdrum and important tasks for making hard lives a little easier.
6. He will listen to and take part in reading some beautiful passages from the Bible. And if he is not familiar with the Bible, he has suffered a loss.
7. He will probably take part in singing some good hymns.
8. He will meet and nod to, or speak to, good quiet neighbors. He will come away feeling a little more charitably toward all the world, even toward those excessively foolish young men who regard churchgoing as rather a soft performance.
9. I advocate a man's joining in church works for the sake of showing his faith by his works.
10. The man who does not in some way, active or not, connect himself with some active, working church misses many opportunities for helping his neighbors, and therefore, incidentally, for helping himself.
This is not as snappy as one of Letterman's lists, but do you think any of the reasons are still valid?
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Why Go To Church?
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2 comments:
I believe this sums up the need for Christian community. Although I love nature and feel very spiritual when next to a brook or in the mountains, I know that I need to be in communnity of other Christians to challenge and support me.
There is a discipline element also in going to church on Sunday - discipline in the sense of a Christian practice - the fleeting moment of awe in nature is one way of experiencing the divine but there is a lot to be said for a regular practice of placing oneself in a situation where focus is made on prayer, praise, learning and singing in the company of others. Worship prepares us and sets the stage for experiencing the presence of the divine.
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