Before Holy Week, I spent a lot of time walking all over the City of Chester handing out flyers and inviting people to church. I got to meet a lot of people that way, but what impressed me the most were the young, devout, African-American Muslims. I can't tell you how many times I heard, "Thank you, Father, but we're Muslims."
Young men and women in the City of Chester are being attracted in droves to Islam. And the Islam they are practicing is not a religion for lazy people. They are praying five times a day. They are practicing their faith constanty, and it requires real sacrifices from them: sacrifices of time, money, energy, and ethical obligations.
Islam is requiring tremendous things from them. It demands a true conversion of life. And they are finding transformation through it.
One of the gravest mistakes Christianity has made in the 20th Century is to make it easy to be a 'Christian.' Want to be baptized? Come on! Just show up half an hour before the service on Sunday and we'll talk through it. Want to be confrimed? Sure! Come and take a class or two and we'll present you to the bishop. Want to get married but don't feel particularly 'religious?' No problem.
If our faith isn't worth a real, daily committment, how can we expect others to commit to it? If we are not experiencing true conversion of life, do we really expect others to? If we make new life in Christ seem that easy to come by, then of course people are going to think it isn't worth giving up a little free time to seek it out.
Christianity has been built on the lives of holy men and women who gave up everything for Christ. Christianity has been built on countless lives through the centuries completely given to prayer and self-sacrifice and to the building of the Kingdom of God on earth. But somehow, in the past sixty or so years, mainline denominations have taught by our laissez faire attitudes that perhaps Christianity isn't really worth a commitment. And now, we can see the results.
What we need is an Awakening. What we need now is a return to the daily life of prayer and service. What we need now is for our congregations to experience true and profound conversion of life. What we need now is to turn religious tourists into pilgrims (to borrow a phrase from Diana Bass, one of my seminary professors), starting with ourselves.
And with Christ, anything is possible.
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4 comments:
Well said, Father.
But what to do? Return to some of the disciplines of the Early Church? Perhaps. The Holy Father alluded to this early in his pontificate when he talked about the future, and the possibility of a smaller, purer Church.
Of course, in this day and age peoples' circumstances do really vary widely, but I am still entirely persuaded that there's a real lack of commitment being demonstrated, and this will mean disaster in the end.
So, by way of example, we'll be having High Masses (and one Solemn Vespers) for the next four days to celebrate the various occurring and transferred feasts. Will the Anglo-Catholics of the parish and the diocese turn out in force to avail themselves of the opportunity to worship together? I rather suspect not, and in most cases it'll be from choice rather than from obligation.
As Carla for Cheers said, so many years ago now, "It's not a religion for wusses!"
Paul,
Thank you for your comment. I agree with you in that there is a lack of commitment pretty much across the board in living the Christian faith. My answer to that is a return to 'Mass and Office' Catholicism, which has nourished and produced so many holy men and women. The process of getting will be a bumpy one, though--especially if there has never been the tradition in a parish. But I live in hope!
But I live in hope!
Just so, Father. May God richly reward you for your enthusiasm and commitment!
This post is great! thank you for recognizing the beauty in other belief systems, keeping humility and taking inspiration, to make it a way of life rather than a Sunday afternoon pastime :)
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