What is in Kelvin's Head?

Freshers: How to Choose a Church

25/09/2014
Every year at this time I find myself thinking about freshers coming to Glasgow to one of the higher education institutions. One way or another I was involved in freshers’ week quite a lot over the years. I did three degrees so went through it myself three times, then in subsequent university years I was one of those helping to put on events and then I worked in university chaplaincy work twice, once before I was ordained and then again whilst I was in Bridge of Allan.

Some students are looking for a church to join when they arrive at University. Some will have checked ahead of time what they want and will have already made contact. Others may find themselves thinking about attending a church for the first time. University years are partly for working out what you think about stuff and working out what you think about the claims that religious bodies make is something that is well worthwhile doing.

Here’s a quick checklist of things that I think Freshers might think about when thinking about how to pick a church.
1. Is there life there? You can usually see that from the website (if it isn’t updated, don’t bother) and you can certainly tell very quickly by turning up.
2. Do you want to be in a church with lots of people your own age or one in which there is a better balance of ages?
3. Do you bring gifts to offer and will they be welcome. (Do you want to sing, work with children, work for the homeless etc) and can the church put you in touch quickly with those you need to speak to.
4. Will all your friends feel welcome at this church if you invite them? Does it celebrate the ministry of both men and women? Are gay folk fully integrated into the life of the church? No-one wants to have brought their gay friends to church and then end up feeling embarrassed because of what was said or done when they turned up. Ask careful questions here – I know a few churches which would say that they were for everyone but which gay people can attend but can’t ever do anything like lead a bible study or alpha group.
5. Does those in leadership in the congregation appear to enjoy being there?
6. Does the congregation appear to enjoy being there?
7. Are there opportunities for you to learn if that’s what you go looking for?
8. Are there opportunities for you to develop your own spirituality and go deeper with your own faith journey?
9. If you call them up and ask for a student contact, can they give you the name of someone who will look out for you if you turn up?
10. Do you get a sense that the preaching is worth listening to?
11. Are they keen to have you turn up (good), disinterested in your turning up (not so good) or desperate for you to turn up (probably not very good at all).

23 responses to “What if this is the end of the Eucharist?”

Thomas Scott

06/05/2020

Just noticing here that DGD (of happy memory) seems to have left out of his catalogue of joyous, sad, perilous, and solemn occasions any instance of celebrating during a plague or pestilence. I’m not worried about the mass. The eucharist need not be celebrated as though it were a car battery, as if not offering it now would somehow allow the power to run down. It is not at risk, we are, which I think is your point. The questions asked are worth asking, of course.

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Mo Nicholson

06/05/2020

Mo Nicholson. This is an intriguing discussion and what I would like to add to it is the observation that I have had to learn the hard way that participation in the Eucharist being made impossible in no way diminishes an individual’s ability to worship God or be in fellowship with other believers. I am barred from receiving Holy Communion in the Catholic church because allergies make this impossible for me. The pain induced by this has little to do with feeling separation from God, in fact nothing at all as I do not feel that. It comes from feeling excluded from the community, different sections if which regard it as desirable or tolerable that a member of the community should be excluded in this way. This experience has made me understand as never before that if we place prime value on liturgical celebrations, ir indeed anything else, above charity, compassion, welcome and inclusivity, in other words love, then we have become the sounding gong which St Paul warned against. If we truly believe that God is love, as I do, then it is obvious that it is love for one another which makes us true children of God our Father, and in light of this we could begin to look at these present challenging circumstances as simply an opportunity to love more, to reach out to one another in whatever way possible in the knowledge that this is what actually matters and always did. Only perhaps we were tempted to almost make a fetish of our rituals, sacraments and so on. And perhaps this can show us a better way more adapted to the world we are supposed to serve.

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Lynsay Downs

06/05/2020

You and your conversation with Dave Roberts prompted me to write this. Does it resonate for you?

https://astonishing.community/2020/05/06/conversations-in-coronatide/

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1. Kelvin
  
  06/05/2020
  
  Thanks Lynsay – yes, it does resonate with me very much.
  
  I’ve shared it on facebook. I think it is really helpful.
  
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Fr Keith

06/05/2020

Thanks again for such a thoughtful piece. With the Eucharist central to much of, at least Anglican/Episcopalian, worship in recent generations, we perhaps forget that the Church in these islands was, between the Reformation and the liturgical revivals of the 19th and 20th centuries, sustained by Mattins and Evensong as the regular diet of worship on Sundays. I’m not advocating a return to such times, but there is, as you suggest, work to be done on non-Eucharistic worship (though not defining it as a negative). Thanks again.

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Fenland Boy

07/05/2020

For the record, I’m not in favour of lay presidency at the Eucharist. I believe, for better or worse, in an ordered church.

Why are you concerned about lay Presidency?

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Chuck

08/05/2020

May I say respectfully, lighten up. Many Anglicans/Episcopalians lived on the edges of civilization in the nascent U.S. and various elements of the British Empire. Priests to celebrate the Holy Eucharist and to baptize were seldom seen, at most twice a year in many areas. (Bishops, only every several years.) The Church carried on in this manner decade after decade. If circumstances require, the Church will carry on again despite our profound sense of loss.

I should add, to those who grew up under threat or reality of war, persecution, oppression, famine, other disease, etc, the present difficulty is not unfamiliar in many respects.

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Miriam MacCarthy

08/05/2020

Thank you! It is wonderful to read these serious, personal thoughts about the Eucharist. My feeling is that it has become celebrated to the point of boredom. Church, and what we do in it, is in danger of becoming simply a habit. It could just as well be crackerjack for a fast-asleep congregation. My heresy is that the direction Jesus gave is to “do this in remembrance of me”, and that means everything we eat at any time, whether alone or with others, in thanksgiving. If that is seriously done, it has vastly more meaning. It really gets ones attention and requires preparation. Would not become popular or usual, I predict!

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