I don't go to church

Shocking title, I know.

But yes. Today is Sunday, and I didn't go to church for the, what, eleventh week in a row? At least. Eleven is just a rough estimate. The point is, I haven't been going to Sunday church for quite a while.

A lot of Christians would shame me for that. I remember in high school, a lot of my teachers said, "When you go to college, make sure you get plugged into a good church; otherwise, your faith will crumble." So based on my church attendance record, my faith should be wilting, right?

Wrong.

The important thing to remember about the church is that it is not a place. It is not a building with stained-glass windows that cost millions of dollars to build. Rather, the church is believers being in community with one another. Which means that "church" is not at all limited to Sunday. It can happen any time believers are hanging out doing whatever.

If we define the church as such, then does it really matter whether or not one attends on Sunday? The way I see it, as long as a believer has a group of other believers which he or she can hang out with--and hangs out with them regularly--then that is sufficient. And I do have that.

But just because one has such a community does not mean that they stop going to a building on Sunday. So why have I made that choice?

The short answer is that rather than a place of growth, Sunday churches are a place where I just get frustrated and jaded. I figure it is probably better for me not to go because of the negative effects it has on me.

The longer answer takes some dissection into what makes me frustrated and jaded. Let's dive in, shall we?

First, the music. I know that I am extremely critical of music because I am a pretty musical person, so maybe this is me just being snobby. But whatever. Most modern worship songs use the same predictable chord progressions, and the melodies are extremely predictable. Also, I can usually predict what words are coming next, even if it's a song I haven't heard. Notice any themes here? There is a phrase: "familiarity breeds contempt," and I find that to be exceedingly true.

Additionally, the lyrics piss me off. Nearly every modern worship song has a positive message. In reality, though, sometimes people need to sing angry songs. Sometimes people need to sing sorrowful songs. Sometimes people need to sing songs about apathy. Coercing a congregation into singing only positive stuff denies that people are all in different emotional states.

Ooh, coercion. Let's talk a bit more about that. There's always the part of the service where the worship leader says, "You may be seated," or "I'd like to invite you all to stand with me." There is a loss of freedom of expression when everyone is asked to do the same thing. Also, if you don't do what the worship leader says, then you can almost count on people questioning your motives for not taking that action.

Stephanie Drury has more to say about the "I'd like to invite you" phrase:
http://www.stuffchristianculturelikes.com/2011/09/221-saying-i-would-invite-you-to.html

Second, the atmosphere. It has always seemed like an unspoken rule to me that Sunday church is not a time to be sad or angry. Rather, there is an expectation that you need to be in a positive mood at church. Now, maybe I'm just assuming this because I haven't been to enough churches, but at every single church I have attended, I have felt this way. I feel that there is no room for the expression of pain, and as such, sometimes people need to be dishonest. They need to hide the shit that they're going through at that time and put on a happy face. As a result, no real community, deep relationships, healing, or encouragement can happen.

Also, I love it when people are expressive in their worship. I love it when churches have flag twirlers, dancers, painters, people speaking in tongues, sign language translators, and/or people raising their hands. I love seeing the different ways in which people use their talents to show how they best worship God. I recognize that this is completely because I have not been to enough churches, but at every church that I have regularly attended, the most that has happened is raised hands. But I can generally count on one hand the number of people that have their hands raised. How. Boring.

Third, the sermons. Someone posed a challenge once to a group of students: to list the five most influential sermons they had ever heard; then to list the five most influential people they had ever known. The students struggled to get past one or two in the first category, but they instantly could think of far more than five people--the struggle there was choosing which five were the most influential. I think that exercise speaks a lot to the power of sermons versus the power of community. People have much more of an effect on other people than sermons do. So then I raise the question, why do we even have sermons? Why don't we just talk to each other, pry into each others' lives, and find out what's really going on? How is listening to one person explicate three or four verses--while sprinkling his (yes, it's almost always a "he," unfortunately) opinion throughout--a better option than real community?

After writing this post, I now see what I desire from church. I just want people to be open and honest. And I currently feel that the way Sunday church is done right now prevents people from doing that.