Church Guilt

 I confess.

I didn’t want to go to church yesterday.

I wanted to stay at home in my pajamas and either lay in bed or work on tin art

While listening to the preacher preach.

 

I’ve gone to church most Sundays of my life.

I didn’t have a choice growing up,

Then church-guilt struck when I did have the choice so I went,

Then I worked on church staffs,

Then church-guilt struck again,

And then the pandemic hit.

Suddenly I found myself without guilt for staying home from church services that weren’t happening.

I volunteered to help pre-record services and I enjoyed that.

Those pandemic days are actually what strengthened my partnership with the church I attend now.

But I liked those guilt-free Sundays.

I liked staying home for a change.

So it’s no wonder that I liked staying home after surgery and

That I didn’t want to go yesterday.

 

But.

I went.

I wish I could tell you that church-guilt wasn’t part of the equation.

It was.

But it wasn’t the old church guilt that instilled fear of God’s wrath and punishment should I not attend--

Rather it was a new church guilt that knew that part of the whole would be missing if I weren’t there.

No. I’m not THAT important.

I just have a place in the choir and a responsibility to sing my part.

We are a team.

We lead worship together.

And when one of us is missing, we are not complete.

 

We can go at our spirituality alone.

We can stay at home and worship with the aid of the many churches that make it possible.

Sometimes we need to stay home because of physical or mental illness.

I know that.

But I also know that there’s something to being surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses and

Worshipping together.

There’s something to the standing and the sitting,

The songs and the silence,

The litanies and the prayers,

The giving and the receiving.

There’s something to being part of the Body of Christ,

And I’m thankful to now understand that

Out of grace, love, acceptance, and peace

Rather than out of church-guilt.

 

Dear God: You know our hearts. You know when we need to go at it alone and when we need to be part of something bigger. Help us to know the difference for ourselves and help us to desire to be with you in worship out of Love for you and neighbor instead of fear of you and gossip. The church can be a beautiful or a damning thing. Help us to make it beautiful and forgive us when we don’t. Amen.