Re: Crisis of faith wracks shrinking United Church (News, Oct. 10)
The problem with most mainline churches, including the United, would seem to be the perception that so much of their teaching is irrelevant.
Who, for example, in today’s economy is prepared to give away their wealth and take no thought for the future but simply depend on God who will look after them as he does the lilies of the field and the birds of the air? The poor and homeless in our society are not exactly admired for their status.
Why should the wealthy be denied entry into the Kingdom of Heaven for no better reason than their fortunes are too large – especially if these have been amassed through hard work and intelligence? If we had rendered unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, we would have never risen in revolt against tyrannies and other forms of injustice.
To be sure, churches encourage and fund charitable endeavours, but who is to say social activism necessarily stems from belief in a supernatural being?
Long before Christian missionaries imposed their creeds on indigenous people, native communities enjoyed a sense of unity and mutual caring.
In our present lop-sided economy where a television personality can make more in a month than a nurse or teacher in a lifetime, the authoritarian voices of organized religion, be they in Rome, Canterbury or elsewhere, are strikingly muted. Need we wonder, then, why church pews are increasingly unfilled?
Jim Skinner
Saanich