Do You Attend Church Services?

Only when I'm photographing a wedding.

Liverpool last week.

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Alizerine said:
We attended many community meetings at a local church. We got to know and like the minister and started going on Sunday.
Years later when the church merged with another, the new people (mainly the minister) drove almost everyone out. I lost a lot of friends and acquaintances. I no longer go.
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I have similar reasons for no longer going, it's the people problems.
 
No. I went to Catholic grade school and was in church almost every day of he week for eight years for some reason or another. I learned from that experience that I want nothing to do with organized religion or church. Haven't gone since. I don't need to go to a church to socialize.
 
Not any more but I'd rather be around and live around those who do
We were raised Southern Baptist and my brother married a Pentecostal lady
My brother became a Pentecostal preacher in the late 70's
Now retired, over the years my brother had churches in three different states.
I have never heard my brother preach. We're brothers but don't discuss religion
I have seen him perform marriages, funerals and heard blessings over family meals
 
Not recently. Churches were closed for the longest time during covid when I really felt the need and desire for church.

I left Roman Catholicism years ago and enjoyed going to a Methodist church nearby instead. It was nice but the pastor left and his replacement left me flat. I haven't been back in years.
 
I had a really bad experience at my previous church, a large one
that freely and extensively used my time and abilities for years, then unceremoniously dumped me when they found someone else that they liked better In the role I served. I left that church as a result, and the experience so soured me that I stayed away from all churches for the next 20 years.

I thought that I could maintain the faith and do it on my own, but I was wrong. You gradually drift away, and community is needed. I’m now an active member of a much smaller congregation, they appreciate me, and I’m glad to be there…
 
Baptist church twice on Sunday and also Wednesday evening. Also attend church during revivals, gospel singings, fellowship dinners and various other get togethers. Though we sometimes take up an offering—not at every meeting—only a few put money in. We never do fund raisers but the money we need is always there when we need it. When a family member passes, they come to help and bring food. Sickness or surgery—same thing. Legal problem or suddenly homeless? They’re there. Book bags when school starts and after school snacks? You got em. Love our Baptists!!
 
-Oy- said:
Only when I'm photographing a wedding.

Liverpool last week.

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Beautiful Church. Never attended a church similar to that. My wife and I attended smaller country Congregational and Baptist churches. We both attended as children and when first married. Continued regular attendance with and until our 4 kids were grown and on their own.
In later years our attendance has been spotty but not because of any disagreement with church principles - moe a liking to sleep in on Sundays.
 
Yes, a Presbyterian church. I like our pastor and trust him and admire his wisdom. Most of the members mean well and participating in the church community is a significant part of my basically meager social life.
However there are some Calvinist, Presbyterian theological convictions that I just don't buy into. I don't make a high profile, vocal issue of it though. I try and follow a Buddhist philosophy of life. I admire Stoic philosophy too. I've lived through a few mystical experiences as well and expect that my consciousness will continue on its journey when my body dies.
None of that constitutes any friction or conflict with the church.....on my part anyway.
 
Warrigal said:
Wow. That is a very diverse list.
If you don't mind me asking, did you stay long in any of them?
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As a child, I was taken to Pentecostal services for a while and baptized by them. Then when I was approx. 12 years old, my aunt Felicita's threatening and terrifying behavior caused me to stay away. The other two, Catholicism and Quakerism, constituted just a few visits. So most of my time was spent trying to do things exactly as Jehovah's Witnesses taught.

However, I don't consider myself as ever being officially in that organization since hey did not inform me about their shunning or disfellowshipping polices prior to baptism and in that way deprived me of informed consent. Had I known, I seriously doubt I would have gotten baptized since I considered my baptism to be between me and God and not subject to constant harassing, fanatical human vigilance.

Here is what happened with my aunt Felicita in reference Pentecostalism. ​

At age twelve, we visited my father's sister, aunt Felicita in Puerto Rico. Well, the first thing I noticed about her was that she would suddenly slam the palm of her right hand against a wall, the dinner table, or any other available flat surface, and yell out “Barkay!” right in the middle of an otherwise normal conversation.

She would also occasionally utter totally unintelligible sounds while invariably claiming to be our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Now, although I was a child, I remained unconvinced. You see, I was familiar with Jesus Christ and had great difficulty imagining him making such garbled sounds while depriving people of their free will. In short, her mental stability began to concern me. She was also very evangelistic.

“Why don’t we all attend church tonight!?” she kept enthusiastically insisting very often out of the proverbial clear blue.

“Some other time,” my father kept calmly responding.

“You are all going to burn in the lake of fire forever if you don’t!” she kept warning.

Well, since that threat didn’t seem to motivate my parents into complying, I figured that it couldn’t really be that serious. However, the more they didn’t comply with her demand, the more erratic her behavior seemed to become. Soon, she began claiming that she had visions of demons invading her house and describing how holy angels would suddenly arrive from heaven to forcefully evict them.

For some reason, she went to great lengths in meticulously describing the gruesome physical appearances of the demons with great relish, but never that of the holy angels. On and on she went, until I really began wishing to get back home to Newark NJ where I wouldn’t have to listen to all her horrifying drivel.

Well, the time to leave was approaching, and that’s when it happened. One moment, my father was criticizing me as usual, I responded in frustration, aunt Felicita suddenly yelled “Barkay!" dropped to the bedroom floor, and began frenetically rolling back and forth as if propelled by some supernatural force.

Then, to my horror, she rose up slowly, as pale as a ghost, her black, limp, hair drenched in perspiration, showing only the white of her eyes, contorting her body in voodoo-like ways.

Then, to my horror, she extended her skinny arms towards me, while making clutching motions with her boney hands, and began to slowly approach me in that semi dark room. My mother hugged me to her chest protectively, but relentlessly, on she came, until she was kneeling right in front of where we were sitting.

“Do you know who I am? I am the Lord Jesus Christ,” she proclaimed calmly, in this deep, threatening, manlike voice I had thought her incapable of producing.

“Why are you disrespecting your father? Ehhhh?” she suddenly said in a threatening tone.

That's when I decided that staying near her wasn’t such a good idea, and that my parents weren’t going to do me any good against this supernatural force. So I cut loose and bolted out of the house into the darkness outside. Now, I didn’t have any particular destination. I just wanted to put some distance between us. I turned left onto the dark, narrow dirt path in front of the house while imagining Aunt Felicita hot on my heels. Then, after running approx. 200 feet, I saw it and came to a full stop. There was what seemed to be a silhouette of a male figure slowly limping in the semi-darkness towards me.

Then , as I squinted to get a better look, I noticed something rather unusual about the shape of its head, as if three large, long, curved horns were protruding from it. So I decided to take my chances with my aunt and bolted back up the dirt path imagining this hideous creature, whatever it might have been, hot on my heels.

Well, to my surprise, I found Aunt Felicita sitting smugly in the living room with my parents as if absolutely nothing unusual had happened. I was shaking and crying from the sheer terror.

“What happened?” my hitherto recently-demonic-looking aunt asked calmly.

After I described what I thought I had seen, and after my father had gone out to investigate and had found absolutely nothing unusual, she said:

“Do you know why that just happened to you? Eh? Do you know?"

"Because I talked back to my father and don’t go to church!” I responded in order to prevent her from coming at me with another terrifying voodoo-like performance.

“That is right! That happened to you because you were naughty with your father and because you don’t go to church. Do you want to go to church now? Are you two going to take him to church now?” she also asked my parents:

“Yes! Yes! I’ll go to church! I’ll go to church!” I fearfully responded before my parents could react. Of course, my parents finally agreed to attend as well after that compelling demonstration.

The next day, late in the evening, we were present at church as promised. Initially, everything looked normal, and I felt that I was under the protection of Almighty God. I listened calmly as a fervent sermon was given and fiery testimonies were provided expressing faith and describing miracles. Listened to the songs were sung enthusiastically accompanied by piano and the palm-slaps on tambourines. Then finally, there was the fervent call for converts to approach the stage to give themselves over to Christ.

Now, I was still observing all this calmly and with great interest, when suddenly, some women on the other side of the church began dropping to the floor and rolling down the aisle exactly as my aunt had done the night before. Then, to make maters even worse, the man standing next to me, began uttering strange unintelligible sounds with a quavering voice followed by many others who began behaving similar to the way my aunt had behaved that unforgettable terrifying night before.

Suddenly, instead of feeling that I was in a church, I felt that my aunt had cunningly led me into a devious trap so she could finish the gruesome ritual she had performed the night before albeit with their help. I panicked and for a brief moment, I considered bolting for the nearest exit.

But then I imagined that they would either intercept me on the way there, or else follow me outside and converge on me in the darkness, you know, hunt me down like in the film The Body Snatchers. So, trembling fearfully for my life, I just stood horrified and endured the situation as best as I could.

Results? After finally arriving back home in Newark NJ, I simply wasn’t the same. I had become a very nervous kid who morbidly feared the darkness, being alone in the apartment, and who flinched fearfully at shadows. I also found that I could no longer sleep with my bedroom lights off, and had developed a fear of this huge crucifix with a glowing green Christ on it which my parents had placed prominently on my bedroom wall. Finally, I had to have it removed in order to sleep in peace.

Naturally, I promised myself never to be exposed to that kind of experience again by avoiding any religion related to it. Now, I’m sure that back at her home, my Aunt Felicita felt she had done an excellent job in evangelizing.

Instead, she had made me a nonreligious, nervous wreck and convinced me that her particular version of what she had chosen to consider Christianity was definitely not for me.
 
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Rose65 said:
I have similar reasons for no longer going, it's the people problems.
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Absolutely! It is the so-called brothers in the faith who serve as stumbling blocks. This despite the serious warning:

Luke 17:2 Jesus said to His disciples, “It is inevitable that stumbling blocks will come, but woe to the one through whom they come! 2It would be better for him to have a millstone hung around his neck and to be thrown into the sea than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.
 
There is a Reform Jewish Temple I would like to join. Yes, I'm an atheist, just feel like hanging around different Jews. Going there would be physically hard for me to do, requiring a long bus ride, but they have stuff on line. A fellow book clubber is a member.

I talk a good story, but don't have a lot of energy. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
 
Every Sunday, but my Christian faith is 24/7/365.

Church is not a building. It's not some specific organizational hierarchy. It's not an "entertainment". It's not about "ME".

Church is a group of people, called by God to His glory, to support and encourage one another and to live, as best we can, lives that reflect His Son's love.
 
Wow, Radrook, I'm sorry that happened to you. I think your aunt probably suffered from a bit of mental illness that was exasperated by her church.

All the churches you listed were rather extreme. Pentecostals speak in tongues and sometimes roll on the floor, Jehovah's Witnesses believe many things that no other Christian denomination believe, their founder seems to have interpreted certain Bible passages in a very original way. Quakers don't have ministers but sometimes have problems with Friends who feel inspired to talk for hours during their meetings. Catholics, of course, have the very powerful Popes and Priests which adds many new rules for the convert to learn.

Have you ever simply gone to a mainstream church? Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran for example? I've been members of all those and attended Episcopalian, Church of England, Baptist. and Community churches.

My current Lutheran church is such a comfort to me, I wish you could have the same experience. The people are kind and accepting. They don't judge me and I don't judge them, if they do imperfect things during the week that's their business, not mine, I'm there to follow Jesus's example, not the congregants, and I know we all fail sometimes.

When the plate is passed, the donations are in the little envelopes provided, no one is counting, it's necessary but not important.

The pattern for all Lutheran sermons, is first the law, then the love. Meaning first we hear about how we should be (at which point we are looking inward, self-examining ) and then reassured that we are loved in spite of coming up short (at which point we hear people sniffling as they feel the forgiveness and loving spirit in the room.)

I think a lot of people had bad experiences with churches in their childhood and that's a shame, because most modern churches tend to be diverse, joyous, and welcoming to all and can add so much to a life.
 

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