Cal
10-29-2008, 09:54 AM
This thread is to comment on the subject of A Future and a Hope chapter 11, by John Myer.
First let me say that this chapter made me laugh out loud several times. The sheer mindlessness of LC group devotional practices is just plain funny.
I haven't been in an LC meeting for years, but what stuck out in this chapter was how little the boilerplate practices have changed in thirty or forty years. The weird and pointless things that bug John Myer today bugged me years ago, and yet they remain to this day, like treasured family traditions. I, too, was embarassed to invite anyone I knew to a meeting lest they witness three or four women standing in unison, shaking their fists and yelling something cross-eyed like "LET US EAT JESUS TILL WE SEE/THAT WE ARE HUMAN JESUSLY!!"
I mean, folks, if you don't realize how weird that seems to normal people then you really need to check into garlic room detox.
Here's another odd practice which some of you may have never thought of, Myer included. How about the matter of calling each other "brother" and "sister" all the time? Most Christians don't do it, and a group that does seems strange. The fact is, most people who don't really know you at all get a little freaked out when you start calling them "brother" right off the bat.
Regardless, the real reason LC practices have never reformed is, yet again, the extreme and imbalanced devotion to oneness, which practically translates to conformity, which psychologically translates to habitually doing things in order to gain group approval. So the devotional practices take on a life of their own. No one dares challenge them because everyone wants to be "one." And public devotional events are the ideal venue in which to show how "one" a person is.
Most of the time when I stood up in an LC meeting and repeated a chorus or verse my motive was to show that I confirmed the group, because I knew the best way to fit in was to conform to and confirm the group's practices, even if they seemed odd to me, which they did.
They seemed odd because they were. Most visitors understand that. As Myer said in just one of the passages that made me laugh out loud: If it sounds like chanting, it is chanting. To deny that makes you doubly odd.
First let me say that this chapter made me laugh out loud several times. The sheer mindlessness of LC group devotional practices is just plain funny.
I haven't been in an LC meeting for years, but what stuck out in this chapter was how little the boilerplate practices have changed in thirty or forty years. The weird and pointless things that bug John Myer today bugged me years ago, and yet they remain to this day, like treasured family traditions. I, too, was embarassed to invite anyone I knew to a meeting lest they witness three or four women standing in unison, shaking their fists and yelling something cross-eyed like "LET US EAT JESUS TILL WE SEE/THAT WE ARE HUMAN JESUSLY!!"
I mean, folks, if you don't realize how weird that seems to normal people then you really need to check into garlic room detox.
Here's another odd practice which some of you may have never thought of, Myer included. How about the matter of calling each other "brother" and "sister" all the time? Most Christians don't do it, and a group that does seems strange. The fact is, most people who don't really know you at all get a little freaked out when you start calling them "brother" right off the bat.
Regardless, the real reason LC practices have never reformed is, yet again, the extreme and imbalanced devotion to oneness, which practically translates to conformity, which psychologically translates to habitually doing things in order to gain group approval. So the devotional practices take on a life of their own. No one dares challenge them because everyone wants to be "one." And public devotional events are the ideal venue in which to show how "one" a person is.
Most of the time when I stood up in an LC meeting and repeated a chorus or verse my motive was to show that I confirmed the group, because I knew the best way to fit in was to conform to and confirm the group's practices, even if they seemed odd to me, which they did.
They seemed odd because they were. Most visitors understand that. As Myer said in just one of the passages that made me laugh out loud: If it sounds like chanting, it is chanting. To deny that makes you doubly odd.