Toxic Traditions

This is from an article by Josh Daffern on 10 Toxic Traditions That Are Killing the Church. I'm quoting his Tradition #1 here. The full article is at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/newwineskins/ten-toxic-traditions-that-are-killing-the-church/ . As usual, you're going to have to remove the forced https since their site is using http. This is a Christian Article but so much of it applies here. I especially recommend the full article to our Christian Members.

We see the church as a building and not the people. If when I say the word ‘church’ you immediately think of a location and a building, that’s a toxic tradition. The church has never been the building. It’s always been the people. Why is this tradition toxic? Too many churches think that if they have the building paid off and enough money to pay the light bill, they can have church. When you think of church as a location, it tempts you to act holy inside a building but then do whatever you want outside of it, because you’re not ‘in church.’ If we understood that the church is the people, then it forces us to put more value on people then we do on buildings. And that doesn’t always happen. Too often buildings and architecture come before people. Early in ministry I had a sweet group of little old ladies that would come into the sanctuary on Thursday mornings after we had our big youth outreach the night before. They were looking for scuff marks on the pew that they could charge me for. For them, was the church the building, not the people.

A lot of this is something that as an ex-Mormon, I can agree with. The Mormon church has a lot of great teachings that stick with a lot of those who grew up with it but a lot of the people at the church were all show (I attended two different buildings and both felt the same). There were lots of people who always were happy to help but when you needed them, weren't anywhere to be found. I feel like a lot of people who attend church on sundays have two faces. While at church, they are as perfect as perfect can get but outside, they are completely different. I see this in person a lot with my own mother and it makes me sick. I love her and care for her but I always tell her that she's a hypocrite sometimes because she doesn't practice what she preaches.

I skimmed through the article and didn't see anything about it (if there was, sorry!) but tithing should have been discussed as well. One of the things that is expected of people when they go to services is that they give a donation. Now, I understand that paying tithing helps to let the operations of the building continue and all that but I have noticed that in some churches it is a thing used to judge if you are worthy of something. This happened to my step father in the Mormon church. Because both him and my mother live off social security and disability, they weren't able to give the 10% that is asked for so when it came time for his Temple recommendation, it was denied. I don't see why that was something that they brought up, it almost seems like you HAVE to pay your way in instead of prove your devotion to your religion and God.

Everything in this article is spot on, in my opinion. I hope that some people read it, learn from it, and perhaps change their ways a bit.

At the Catholic Church I grew up in they accepted donations two ways. Anyone was welcome to ask for free special envelopes that would be credited to their account for tax purposes, but people could also donate anonymously by throwing the money in the collection basket. I don't remember them using much time talking about money. Sometimes there would be a special collection for a particular purpose and they'd mention it but I don't recall them ever harping on it.

ah, I see. I saw this more in my family's church and the smaller Pentecostal churches that my friends went to. I remember the preacher's words like it happened yesterday, he said "remembers brothers and sisters, give, give. Give and you will we rewarded and well on your way to eternal salvation!".

it was like something out of a movie, I kid you not. It was shocking to me that someone would use those words. Everyone knows you can't buy your salvation but this guy was like a shepherd corralling his sheep.

Years ago, a friend of mine and his wife were going to join a church in a small town. They were given a list of all the church expenses and told if they wanted membership in the church, they would be required to pay X dollars as a membership feee. I think it was probably a few thousand.

Of course we had another church somewhere in the area that was more like a cult. They required members to sell all of their personal belongings and give the money to the church, and then the church would support them.

That is one of the reasons I won't go near a Christian church anymore. A lot of it seems to have become more about worship of greed, that's just not my thing.

In particular, many of the traditions seem stemmed from human nature and economics to a degree.

Many people view the building as the final stop, the goal of having a sacred place to worship. Unfortunately, we have to buy land, maintain the property and building, and in order to keep it running we have to hire bodies to fill key positions and bring in a head of the church. These create obligations that have to be taken care of and turn the church into a business almost. Church financing is a horrible nightmare in which you have to base all of your budget based around voluntary contributions of last year, and even so much as a good harvest or a new pastor can influence tithing immensely. I've known multiple pastors to have to work a second job to pay the bills and some churches to simply have to cut swathes of special operations because they simply didn't collect enough the first two quarters.

What has happened was the passionate hobby has become a job and it's an attachment that can bring everything down. The church that is struggling financially will begin to sermonize more on tithing, begin more collection attempts, speak and try to woo money out of the congregation because the congregation are the customers. It's a terrible thing because now the church is more worried about money than it is about teaching and preaching. I recall when I was younger, my church had a financial crisis and sent the collection plate back and had two tithes that service and asked several employees to volunteer their time for a little bit. It failed to produce enough results and we lost vacation bible school, other special programming, and we had to start looking for a newer, cheaper pastor.

The focus becomes on money because that's how you keep pastors and services you like, and keeps the church that everyone is so proud of running, but that financial focus leads to some pretty cut throat measures which is sad and locks money used to help those who need it most into saving it in case they can't pay the landscaper.

One of the biggest reasons I left the church was how it viewed others. As I was learning to preach, I was carefully never offered to give a sermon again after I did a sermon on tolerance and love. It wasn't until later I found out that I had given a sermon that some of the older members disagreed with and instead of engaging in discourse, I was blacklisted from teaching or preaching. It's a xenophobic atmosphere in which the church I had grown up in, and that people who had helped raised me turned against me because I said "God loves everyone" and explained the concept of "everyone." The entrenchment in their ideals and refusal to meet with me on it lead to me opening my eyes for more issues that there were a double standard on and I found many and a great deal of fear. I started playing D&D and was counseled on how it leads to magic and the demon summoning, and when presented with the books and shown that that would be an amazingly complex feat for D&D to lead to that I was given a "You don't see how it can affect you because you like it so much, don't bring those books back" response. The xenophobia of new ideas prevents the youth, the ones who are exploring new ideas, from wanting to stay in the church.

Youth groups grow when they can connect through their culture to the church. The reason most youth don't stay is because there is nothing keeping them there, it's not fun nor engaging. The joke that Christian rock music is universally terrible is an indication that if Christian youth don't like it, there is a disconnect. You are trying to feed steak to a cow, it's not going to work and you will not keep the youth there. The xenophobia can crippled a church, the church I attended once had 120 active members, and 4 who were between the ages of 15 and 18. No one wanted to come because it wasn't a happy place that made children happy to be there, it was very much "you made God sad, so you feel sad too" kind of place.

Unfortunately, many of the items on that article are reasons why churches stagnant or people who leave never come back.

Br. John excellent article. I grew up Catholic and my mother is still very religious (shes an oblate at a monastery in Indiana). I wanted to put this in here though because it had some comedy wisdom to share. Warning: It is totally offensive, it's South Park so be forewarned. I grew up watching this since second grade.....(good parenting right, lol) but actually the context that my father put into the different media he allowed us to watch influenced things as an adult incredibly. Anyways, there are some points that this episode covers comically that prove true to any religion,
I think. The episode, I wont post a ling but it is on Hulu or Southparkstudios online, is Season 6, Episode 8, titled "Red Hot Catholic Love". Some of the best comedy is born from the worst faults of the human race, however it forces us to confront the problem even if some what obscure way. This can lead to some wise points, again this is pretty offensive episode as far as jokes go, however, the message at the end is important and valuable.

If there is an issue of posting something as such that maybe offensive as far as comedy and an approach to something as such is out of line please let me know and my apologies in advance.

Sincerely,
Tim

I can see this article telling the truth about some things
like in the Christain bible it goes

Give 2/10 of what you earn and God will bless you,
about 10 years ago I and my dad went to this Church iit was a Methodist church
and My dad give two bucks and I thought about for 30 seconds
while my dad was holding the collection plate and I pull out $2.00
just to test the Peacher, a few Sundays later the preacher had told everyone

Thank yall for the money, because I had bought a jeep alarm and My wife and me dinner.,

I was so mad that Never went back...


Give 2/10 of what you earn and God will bless you,
is a lie, the way I see it. because God does not need your money the Church does..

I mean if God himself ask me for money I would give to him without question,
But I have a problem tide ing to Churches because that story has taught me to be cautious

so yes CLAPS good article BR. John

I won't doubt the truth of any given anecdote, but given the sheer number of churches and religions, a tale of "One time I met a Church official who was also a bell end" does not spell doom for the concept of organised religion.

And....I almost have a counter point - Everyone wants something for free.

Well, people gotta eat, including the Clergy.
You want advice on your car? Well mate, that knowledge will cost you a shilling.
I'm not saying you should be able to "buy" salvation or somesuch, or that "God" needs your money - but the people who serve you still gotta eat, and money is (often) a fairly easy sacrifice for you to make on their behalf - but you need to feel it as it is intended - you are looking after them as they look after you - it's a slightly different vibe than say, paying for entry to a nightclub.

Br. John's point of folk "Missing the forest for the trees" is well made, and whilst in this case the bent of conversation has gone towards a financial theme, the same is true of the "mood"

You go to church you feel "Holy" and good, and an hour in the fancy building of a Sunday (or whatever your custom is) gets you "credits" for being a rubbish human the rest of the week.

This I believe is the "toxic" tradition of greater concern. (I'm not happy about the use of the word toxic here, but unlike Ob1, I have surrendered in the fight of prescriptive language ) - Which, in one way or another, the other nine "traditions" also more or less say.


I will applaud our friends at Patheos for trying to be hip in their articles.

I may have gone with "7 Traditions that you didn't know were Toxic!"
or "These 8 new Toxic Traditions will Surprise you!"

(No one uses anything divisible by 10 any more)

Good article Br. John and I appreciate you. However, I find this to be a very negative subject on other churches. Yes, there are a lot of churches and yes, they all have their own ways and some are cults and really ruin the purity of the message of Christ for a person. The building isn't the church or what makes the church that's all materialism Jesus never had a physical building if you really read the gospels nor, did Paul, peter or any of the Apostles if you really read the Bible or study it for yourself.

I said to another Jedi today that it would still be nice to have a physical Jedi church but, it's not what makes TOTJO after all we all came to this website and no one invited us either.