What you guys are failing to see is that organized religion as you call it or churches do far more than have service on Sunday and pass the collection plate around.
I totally agree that SOME churches are very materialistic and very money hungry. I've personally been to a church just like that. As a matter of fact, when my wife and I were looking around to find a church we wanted to be members of when we got married (two different backgrounds) we ran across a church just like that. They literally sent us a letter shortly after going there that basically said we weren't "giving" enough to support the church. I'd never had that happen to me before, and I never went back to that church again.
So I understand where some of you guys are coming from, but I want to assure you that is NOT the mold MOST churches follow. MOST churches do indeed help out their own community and help out their own parishoners and even help out other churches. I have personally seen that happen, so it's not a sales pitch. I've done my share of "service projects" that helped out total strangers that had nothing to do with our church. My church has our "great day of service" coming up in Sept. It is 32 individual projects that people signed up to help with. It could be anything from helping indigent people with their homes or chores to public works in the community to soup kitchens (which we have one that we run on a regular basis BTW) etc, etc. It is totally volunteer. It is totally up to you to do it. It is something our church has been doing for the last 4 years as a way for us to help not just ''us", but our surrounding community as well REGARDLESS of their religious belief or affiliation.
I've painted a very frail little old lady's house during one these "projects" before. She heated her house via an old school pot belly stove. Needless to say her entire house was soot riden inside and out. We took out everybit of her furniture outside and repainted it and the entire house. We repaired shingles that were long over due to be fixed. Fixed her plumbing which had rags wrapped around it and a bucket to keep from leaking on the floor. It was a very fullfilling 3 day project for me. The kicker was......the lady was an Atheist. She didn't believe in God at all.
I'm not going to make up a story and say that it was a hollywood ending to that. She was still just as Atheist the day we left as she was when we arrived. Her son was the contact person who asked for help thru his BAPTIST church (I'm not baptist) but they decided to contact us since we were already going to be doing this type work.
So you see, none of what we did sunk in to her as religious. None of what we did changed her point of view. None of what we did was done for either of those two purposes. It was done because it was the right thing to do for another human being in need, period. I'm sure she's happy the ceiling in her house is now NOT black and leaking. I'm sure she's happy her sink doesn't overflow on the floor. Personally, I'm glad I did it because it gave me far more in the long run than I ever gave her.
I'm a lay pastor at my church. One of the things I do is visit sick people in the hospital. Not to preach to them, I'm no preacher. Not to ask them for money or to join our church. I go there simply to ask them if there is anything I can do for them. Sometimes it's just mere companionship. People get really lonely when they're sick you know. Sometimes it's just physical chores.....get them up out of the bed into the bathroom, or go to their house and feed their animals or cut the grass or get their prescriptions. Sometimes it is spiritual. They want you to pray with them or for them, surprisingly the sick usually worry more about others than they do about themselves. The point is that about 1/2 of the people I visit are NOT members of our church. They could be a relative or a friend of one of our members, but that doesn't matter. Someone needs something, big or small, so we try and help. Their religious belief or status is never even considered.
Originally Posted by Jaimecbr900
What you guys are failing to see is that organized religion as you call it or churches do far more than have service on Sunday and pass the collection plate around.
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