Burning in Church

15 Responses to "Burning in Church"

• Comment by: Julie marie

  1 07/12/06 1:24 PM | Comment Link |

  I haven’t heard this before, but I’ve heard christians say to other christians, in a joking way “oh, you are sooo going to burn for that” and I wish they wouldn’t talk like that. I haven’t ever confronted it because I don’t want to draw even more attention to the comment, and its always in a social situation where there are lots of people looking on. A good way to kill a festive atmosphere is to get into a deep theological discussion about hell, dontchaknow.

• Comment by: NCxian

  2 07/12/06 1:47 PM | Comment Link |

  I also haven’t heard this before. Is the message intended to be, “I am so bad a person that God would strike me dead for daring enter his presence?” Said in such a way that the person is kind of bragging about how bad they are? Which would be a little sophomoric, I think (or at least something I’m pretty sure I participated in, in a big way, as a sophomore!).

• Comment by: Julie marie

  3 07/12/06 2:00 PM | Comment Link |

  I wonder, not ever having heard that, but just thinking about it…have the Pharisees so convicted people of their moral failures that they actually don’t want to step into a church?

• Comment by: Eliza

  4 07/12/06 2:19 PM | Comment Link |

  I have heard people jokingly say they would taint a church, or God would strike them with lightning, if they walked inside (ie, they’re such sinners that they shouldn’t go into a holy place). I’ve not heard anyone say the church would burn down or explode, but it seems like a similar train of thought.

  I have been guilty of saying “I’m going to burn for that one” after making a particularly cutting (I like to think, incisive and insightful but cutting is probably more accurate) comment about something to do with Christianity - for example, commenting on a clip on the news on something Pat Robertson or someone like that said (when I really disagree with what he said, which is almost always). But I’ve only said that in conversation with my husband, don’t think I would ever say it in other company, and I wouldn’t say/think that about going into a church, whether to attend a service or etc.

  I suspect that the welcome mat hasn’t been as apparent to non-churchgoers as churchgoers tend to think…seems like the message that’s being received is that you have to be good/holy to go to church, rather than that all are welcome, or that the door is wide open in welcoming sinners (gotta be careful how you apply the term sinners, though, imo). I’m unchurched (worse than that - an atheist ;) ) and it’s probably just through reading the New Testament starting last year, and my involvement in the online discussions around off the map, that it’s become apparent to me that all are welcome. (Though, at some present-day churches there may be expectations that you’ll act one way or another, maybe even dress one way or another, once you’re in the door….)

• Comment by: mw

  5 07/12/06 5:41 PM | Comment Link |

  “If you are a churchgoer who has heard this response before, what has been your response?”

  We don’t burn heretics anymore ? :-)

  Seriously, I’ve never heard someone say this, but like Eliza, I’ve heard people say something indicating they are not worthy to enter a church building. Isn’t that the whole point?

• Comment by: mw

  6 07/12/06 5:46 PM | Comment Link |

  Or, better said, worthiness or unworthiness isn’t the issue, and if you think it is, you’ve probably already bought into being unworthy, with or without “benefit” of religion.

  IMO, to enter a church is to enter liminal space, birth-death space, full of possibility, chaos, and magic, and everyone is invited to be part of it.

• Comment by: Doreen

  7 07/12/06 8:07 PM | Comment Link |

  Guilty!

  I’ve said something similar. For many years, I had a real problem entering churches, particularly Roman Catholic ones. This was partly due to where I was in my recovery from Catholicism. (And since most of my family is still RC, I mean MY recovery only about ME and not as an indictment of the whole denomination.)

  A couple of years ago, I began to have problems in any church that wasn’t a Unitarian Universalist one. I thought, “If they knew I was gay, they wouldn’t want me here,” “wouldn’t be so friendly,” etc. I would be in fear of the time in the service where the gay bashing would begin. It didn’t usually happen; who said I was being rational? I’d watch all kinds of services and preachers on TV, wanting to hear the message, but again, in fear of when the message would turn from Good News to You’re Doomed.

  Beginning with attending a service at seminary put on by the convenent discipleship groups that semester (including the one to which I belonged), I started crying in church. I was so frustrated. I felt like I wanted to “get it” and “feel it” like everyone else, but just couldn’t/didn’t. I couldn’t go through the motions either. It was extremely painful.

  Since I accepted Christ, I no longer have this fear every time I go to church. I know which ones locally I can go to and not have to worry about it. I’m still not very comfortable in RC services. But I can say I passed a very important milestone in my RC recovery when I was able to take communion in April with friends at their AME church for the 1st time since accepting Christ.

  Thanks for asking such a caring question.

  doreen

  p.s. We could list all the ways some churches make attenders feel unworthy. I’d start with one of my biggest pet peeves, the prosperity gospel churches.

• Comment by: Todd

  8 07/12/06 9:11 PM | Comment Link |

  Thanks for some great comments everyone. I am actually suprised most of you have never heard this statement before. I hear variations of it all the time. I guess the motive I had for this post was that its really a sad commentary on how we, as church communities, somehow teach people that God is the big man up in the sky who can’t wait to smite all the evil doers (as if he couldn’t do it even if you weren’t in a church building.

  In reality it should be the opposite. I pray that people can say “At least I know I can go to church because I know that God just wants to love me and his followers do as well.”

• Comment by: Eliza

  9 07/13/06 8:28 AM | Comment Link |

  So, how does that message go out? Is it intentional in some church communities (certainly not in all), or is it inadvertent, or does it come from secular messages (like movies and books)?

  Doreen, it sounds like you have been through a really tough time finding places where you feel welcomed - even since you accepted Christ. Could you tell a bit more about your observations of how the message “you’re not welcome” (or “you might not be welcome”) goes out?

  Todd, thanks for this topic!

• Comment by: Todd

  10 07/13/06 11:11 AM | Comment Link |

  Eliza, some great questions. I think some of the “God is out to get you” attitude that is out there comes from popular culture and misceptions about God that the church has little control of. That side of things we can’t really control.

  but, i do feel like we can do our best to portray communities that don’t push forward this view of God. It’s sad to me that people like Doreen have the experiences they have. If Chuches can do ther best to break the stereotype in individual circumstances that will go a long way…

  of course, part of the problem is that when you finally have a community that is genuinely loving, how do you get someone to come for the first time and figure that out since they are convinced such places do not exist? I think that’s where the church can’t always ask people to come to us and we need to bring the church to them. that might look a lot different than we could ever imagine but I think its something that needs to happen more…

• Comment by: NCxian

  11 07/13/06 11:59 AM | Comment Link |

  Philip Yancey tells a story about a woman who had all kinds of problems–drugs, prostitution–and mostly needed somebody to care about and for her, help her turn in a positive direction. He asked her if she ever thought about going to church. She said “Why would I do that? I already feel bad enough as it is?”

• Comment by: Eliza

  12 07/13/06 4:20 PM | Comment Link |

  Wow - that’s damning, so to speak…

• Comment by: jeff

  13 07/17/06 2:30 PM | Comment Link |

  I have heard it said “If I walked into church the roof would cave in.” And I think it means: I haven’t been in so long that to change my habit would throw off the delicate balance and cause said catastrophe. It would be bad luck.

• Comment by: Matt Casper

  14 07/17/06 8:17 PM | Comment Link |

  Hi Todd,

  Matt Casper here, “practicing” Atheist. The quotes are because Atheists don’t practice…it’s a non-belief. There’s no way to practice a “non” anything… you can’t practice non-football, can you? But I digress…

  I think the “the burning” comments are just non-church folks going with the fire-and-brimstone flow. There’s an awful lot of burning talk that happens in a lot of churches, most if it directed at the non-believers. Perhaps, for some folks, it’s a pre-emptive strike…?

  I have said variations of the phrase before myself, and it is truly just a joke, though an unoriginal one. In my opinion, non-church folks use that sarcastic phrase as a defense mechanism, be it ever so slight.

  E.g., Rather than say, “Church makes me uncomfortable,” it’s an easier out to say “I’m too bad-ass for church.” Kind of like kids, really… it’s easy to see a kid who will make some grandiose boast rather than be called chicken.

  That said, and “the church will burn if I enter” also said, I have been going to church. A lot. So far, no fires. No literal fires, anyway…more than a few figurative ones, though…

  More to come…
  Matt

• Comment by: Helen M.

  15 07/18/06 7:12 AM | Comment Link |

  Matt, thanks for your comments. What you say makes sense to me.

  By the way, I think it’s time for a CatE blog entry update on your church visits…I’ll be e-mailing you about that…

  Anyway, I’ve been meaning to post on this thread that it reminds me of something I said to a pastor at my then-church some years ago. He was at his computer and said “We don’t have your wedding anniversary date in our computer”. My response was “If you put that in it might break it” because - as we both knew - I married an atheist, a marriage ceremony I had gone outside that church to have performed. I didn’t even ask if they would do it because I knew there was no way they’d marry a Bible-believing Christian to an atheist.

  Although the topic was a little different I think my reasons for saying that were similar to why someone who doesn’t go to church might say the things Todd wrote. I agree that it’s a pre-emptive strike. Maybe it’s a joke but there’s an edge to the joke - there’s a sense in which it hurts less if I say it myself about myself before you can say it to me (just in case you were about to say it to me).

  Oh, the pastor was nice in response. He said something like “of course not” and smiled - as I recall.