My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Inspired by my recent rewatch of Datenshi no Namida, but addressing an issue that I have been thinking about for quite a while, most recently prompted by reading Kathrine Lilleøre's autobiography "Woman, why are you crying?" in which she - amongst other things - tells about the reasons for her church's attempt to divide church service into Sunday preaching for the regular attendants and daily services for the people who "merely" wish to use the church for baptism, confirmation, marriage and funerals.
”Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is to say, ”My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
In recent years Denmark has been the stage of a lively discussion about the church. Because over the past decade the church has experienced less and less people attending service, less and less people taking part in the life that surrounds the churches and the age of those who do going through the roof. This is to say, in simpler terms, the church is losing its audience and its active participants get older and older with no younger generations to replace them. The discussion that has taken place in the media and amongst the public is, explained very simply and without many of the aspects that have also been presented, whether or not the church “has served its purpose”, whether or not “the necessity of the church” has ceased to be of importance.
The central issue at stake here is what we in Danish call “the broadness of the church”. Many of those who are still invested in the church think that we have moved past the era where we have to focus on people in general and instead should use our efforts to give the loyal church-goers an environment that fits them. Why should we spend time and energy on people who only come once a year, at Christmas, or whenever someone in their family is getting baptised, confirmed, married or buried? If they are not interested in the church, the church will not welcome them. End of discussion. That is what many in this debate think, both of those who are amongst those who only attend church at Christmas and amongst those who still show up every Sunday. The first group because they don’t feel like paying taxes to an institution that has no value to them, the second group because they feel they are being neglected, both by society and by the church itself.
What do I think? Had you asked me this question two years ago, I would have answered that I think people should either invest themselves in the church or get the fuck out and leave the rest of us in peace to worship in a manner that fully mirrors our level of devotion and doesn’t have to pay heed to the one unfortunate culture-religious person who has to show up because his nephew has been given the name “Christian”. Because two years ago I thought myself a better Christian than the “Christian” who only showed up out of habit on Christmas Eve. Two years ago I thought myself more loved by God than the “Christian” who would only seek His guidance when he had lost a beloved grandmother or wife. Both ideas are very arrogant. Neither is very Christian.
And now? Well, it’s a complex situation for sure. I still think that the Christians who attend service often should meet an environment there where their beliefs and religious issues are fully addressed and not avoided or simplified simply to be sure that the family who has to see their daughter married doesn’t feel alienated or neglected. At the same time I have overcome my theological arrogance and my belief that just because I end every day with a prayer to God, I am more loved by Him than the person next door who doesn’t spare God a thought until his son is killed in a car accident.
Because the crux of the matter is that the Christian who turns up every single Sunday and the Christian who only shows up at Christmas are equal in the eyes of God if they in their hour of darkness cry out His name and seek His help. If Denmark closes down the public institution of the church and makes it private, the person who shows up at the church door because he sees no other way out than approach the very essence of faith will have nowhere to go. A sheep will be lost, because the shepherd is too busy tending to his flock to go look for the one sheep which has strayed. As far as I remember that isn’t what Jesus taught us to do. No, the shepherd in Jesus’ tale let the flock tend to itself (because he knew it was more than capable of doing so) while he went searching for the one sheep that would only remember the necessity of the flock once it went hungry - then to discover that it could not find its way back without an intermediate. The shepherd. The church.
Does this mean that the other sheep should not be fed and not led to lush pastures? No. This isn’t a question of either or. It’s a question of making room for both approaches to belief and incorporate both into church service. Maybe if the Danish church starts doing this instead of focusing on which group to please, it would indeed be broad. Not because it focused on “Christian” who only turned up for his baptism - in the feeble and desperate hope that the rest of the church goers would come anyway - but because it made room for “Christian” at his baptism and the other Christians when they showed the Sunday after.
X-posted to christianity.