Why Should I Go to Church?

November 16, 2012 7,329 Views

Summary

Why can’t I just pray at home? God is everywhere, so why can’t I go out in the woods and worship there? I don’t need to go to Church and have people telling me what to do. I have the Bible. All the rules are in there.”

“Why should I go to Church? Why can’t I just pray at home?” God is everywhere, so why can’t I go out in the woods and worship there? I don’t need to go to Church and have people telling me what to do. I have the Bible. All the rules are in there.”

How often have we come across people who don’t understand the need to go to Church or to frequent the sacraments? Maybe we’ve been caught a bit flat-footed and that hampered our efforts to explain why attending Mass is so important. We know it’s important, but we might have had trouble putting the reasons into words.

Maybe we were put on the spot and everything we wanted to say and knew we should say refused to be articulated. I am humbled to say that this has happened to me. I know the why but was caught off guard.

I wasn’t sure how to frame a response that would not antagonize the questioner, but would, rather, plant a seed. Today I found one possible way to respond when I was looking through my e-mails. It made me think and it made me smile. I hope it will do the same for you.

Why go to Church?

If you’re spiritually alive, you’re going to love this!

If you’re spiritually dead, you won’t want to read it.

If you’re spiritually curious, there is still hope!

A Church goer wrote a letter to the editor of a newspaper and complained that it made no sense to go to church every Sunday.”I’ve gone for 30 years now,” he wrote, “and in that time I have heard something like 3,000 sermons. But for the life of me, I can’t remember a single one of them. So, I think I’m wasting my time and the pastors are wasting theirs by giving sermons at all.”

This started a real controversy in the “Letters to the Editor” column, much to the delight of the editor. It went on for weeks until someone wrote this clincher:

“I’ve been married for 30 years now. In that time my wife has cooked some 32,000 meals. But, for the life of me, I cannot recall the entire menu for a single one of those meals. But I do know this. They all nourished me and gave me the strength I needed to do my work. If my wife had not given me these meals, I would be physically dead today. Likewise, if I had not gone to church for nourishment, I would be spiritually dead today!

When you are DOWN to nothing….. God is UP to something! Faith sees the invisible, believes the incredible and receives the impossible! Thank God for our physical AND our spiritual nourishment!”

When your children or family members or friends, of whatever faith, ask why Church is so important how do you respond? How do you tailor your answers to the person or people who are asking? I’m sure any responses you would like to share would be greatly appreciated and very helpful.