Church, again

Church has become a chore. I hate that a little bit. I want that special place to go feel connected to others and something bigger, but since Tim has stopped pushing for it (and since we heard someone we really liked and wanted to get to know has mysteriously stopped attending as well) I don't have much inclination to go. And if I'm being honest, as much as I liked attending this summer, at the heart of it, I only went because it was important to Tim.

He somehow has the ability to put on his filter so he can interpret the Christian-speak and apply the feeling and overreaching ideas to his pagan sensibilities. I am not so inclined.

When I think of church, it's the little church on the hill in Kansas, an old gracious building with stone walls, soaring stained glass windows, and a quiet sanctuary. The dusty basement where I went to Peace Meetings with my parents as a child, and attended youth group as a teen. I have trouble finding any sense of presence in a movie theatre, where they don't sing stately hymns, and there is no choir for me to join, because instead they sing new Christian soft rock.

One of my favorite movies is Saved! because of my experience at church camp, but the new movement in Christianity that makes it so hip is really not my speed.

I want quiet and stately, not raised arms and personal relationships with Jesus.

I think it's because I can get what I need from a quiet moment, and I call that spirituality, but Jesus doesn't figure into it.