yeah but, no but, yeah but

A Little Britainy (the programme not entertainer’s offspring) I know, sorry.

We were away at the weekend staying at friends and we went to a Congregational church in Ashby-de-la-Zouch, a place I have always wanted to visit as it sounds so unusual. It isn’t. But the service that day was and it was cafe church done very well with brunch laid on and papers strewn around and actually used as the basis for parts of the worship. I enjoyed it. It seems that some of the locals are not so appreciative. I was speaking to the minister there in the pub (I know on a Sunday!) afterwards and she was lamenting how her ‘folk’ (there’s that word again) are resistant to change. They like the same format at the same time sitting in the same seats. Old people, really, so stuck in their ways.

It turns out this was the local for the  minister.

That’s right, she goes there every Friday.

Oh and they have the exact same drinks.

And I do believe they sit in the same seats.

I’m sure that’s different, just trying to work out how.

It’s All Greek to Me

Alpha - what does it bring to mind? First, dominant, greek, spaghetti (alphabeti)? I should think that the reason the Alpha Course is so named is that it is deemed to be the first step to christian faith (I wonder for how many people it is also the Omega course?).

I struggle with it. From where I sit it pupports to give a whole load of answers to the wrong questions - or rather it pupports to giving answers to the right questions, I just think it is answering the wrong ones.

The Alpha course is an introduction to christianity.We should be introducing people to God.

The web site also contends that Alpha is for everyone. Well, everyone who is interested in being a christian. So that rules out an awful lot of people for whom christianity is at best an irrelevance, at worst something to be mistrusted and avoided. Interestingly they have Alpha for different contexts, prison, youth, student, forces and CATHOLICS. I was very interested in why the catholics should have their own alpha context but unfortunately that page can’t be found on their web site. If anyone can illuminate me then please do.

I think the apparent success of Alpha is because churches are desperate. They are dying on their collective arses and will, probably, try anything. As I have stated before in other articles, I firmly believe that there is no formula for turning round the decline in church attendance. There is no ‘one big thing’ that can be taken from church to church that will guarantee full houses in its wake.

This is what is so exciting about the ‘emerging church movement’ for me. Where it truly emerges to fulfill a need in a community of people it will work and it will change that community for the better. Sticking our usual worship practices in a cafe does not make a cafe church. Meeting people where they are on their life journey and making a connection with them, allowing them to encounter God without the need for them to learn how to is the way forward, there are no courses in it, no packaged solutions - just get out there and do it.

Sad Cafe

Great band of the 70’s sadly missed… well when I say great band, they were from Stockport and they did have a rather saucy first album cover, or so me, Mark and Glenn thought at the time.

The reason I refer to them today is a story I heard about a cafe church in Wales that my brother-in-law attended. He said that he thought this might be interesting for him to see, he is a URC minister himself, but after the childrens address and the notices he was starting to wonder if this heralded the dawn of a new era of being church.

He managed to leave during the sermon…