Lionel draws attention to Churches' ad for Christmas and asks Would any practising Christians care to comment on this?
I think it's irrelevant to practising Christians, who'll go to Church, anyway, or to people of other faiths, or atheists, or uninterested parties.
Surely the people the churches should be trying to attract are those who who have a faith in God, who want to pay more attention to their spiritual side, but are deterred by the churches themselves.
The biggest deterrent to worship is churches. My principle opposition to most organised religion is their dogmatic attitude to matters of human relationships and sexuality, in particular their continuing subjugation or stereotyping of women. This is coupled with the dreadful tradition of sermons within most Christian churches. I really can't see the point of being lectured to by a rather dim chap who has little intellectual rigour, limited knowledge and a narrow experience of life. To find an intelligent clergyman is a rarity. Very few of them are capable of understanding theology and philosophy. The best of the rest limp by on simplistic parables and platitudes, and far too many of them use the sermons to impose their sick psychology on the ears of their willing sheep.
Most congregations are little better. Every church has a large proportion of ostentatious worshippers. They include the woman who bustles self-importantly, organising the readers, and the brass polishers; and the man who feels the need to prostrate himself with arms across his body each time he leaves his pew.
And then there's the Cartwrights. A memory that haunts me from twenty years ago. The Cartwrights were a devout family. It always struck me how weirdly shaped the males were. Tall, and not exactly beanpoles, but very bony. Hips that stood out at angles. Greasy hair and wispy moustaches. Mother Father two sons and daughter. Each one of them ugly as fuck and incapable of smiling. Some of them did readings. They frequently did the offertory procession. In a dull suburban church full of Tory-voting sanctimonious social climbers, doing the offertory was status. Not a personality between them. I used to people watch during Communion. You'd spot your classmates and signal 'We'll chat outside." You'd play 'spot the hunk from the Boys School'. Special marks were awarded for Spot the Footballer or Chief Constable. Most people ambled up, some walked demurely. Not the Cartwrights, though. Always led by Pompous Papa they walked down the aisle in an obvious show of piety. Glided in religious rapture. Not only did they hold their hands in the universal prayer grasp, but with their arms stretched out from the elbow, to ensure that everybody could see how holy they were. Mind you, in their defence, they never used church as the opportunity to show off the latest expensive fashionable clothes.
Digression aside, my personal view is that if churches want to up their audience they should attempt some spirituality and theology. Certainly in the Catholic Church, the weekly mass is no more than recital of a set formula, reminiscent of times tables in infant school, and a total absence of prayers. I can see why evangelical churches, independent or within the existing churches, are so popular.
If somebody can point to me a church that encourages prayer, insists on high musical standards, has clergy with rigorous, questioning and reflective intellect, avoids sermons and set services, believes in the equality and uniqueness of each human being, discourages attendance by the reluctant and co-erced, encourages dressing down, is aware that this is the 21st Century and prefers weekday to evenings to 'show your face on Sunday to conform', I might go to it. A poster of Santa in a manger, condemning the Bacchanalian outrages of a traditionally Bacchanalian festival will not persuade me to darken the door outside of hatchesmatchesanddispatches.
