only on my two thousandth coffee

This blog is in response to this one, by one of my favourite bloggers, LtK. She just moved to a new city, in a new country, away from a church she loved and felt loved at (incidentally, the church I went to as well), and started to look for a new church.

I found this blog particularly interesting because I've been experiencing something similar. I haven't moved to another country - in fact, I haven't even left the province. I'm just an hour's drive away from Toronto, but having finished my degree and going to another school and moving, I just felt like it was time to find another church. I wanted to be at a church near where I live so I could actively be involved in the community.

That was two years ago. Since then, I've been to at least seven different churches. Many different kinds of services, but mainly I've been looking for words like "youth" and "contemporary worship." I joke that I've become a church hopper, but I feel less like an adventurous nomad but more like an intrusive couch-crasher. LtK talks of standing around awkwardly, waiting for someone to talk to you, which I certainly relate to*. But more than that, I feel like I'm always standing on the outside, first of all, watching how the people treat each other, and secondly, I find myself critically observing the worship and service, not willing to buy into anything completely. After going to the same church for four years, it's hard for me to accept anything that's not exactly the same.

But I forget that God is in all these places, and He can't fit into the single church model I've made in my mind. It's really me that's far too limited to be able to fit into these other churches. On one hand, it's wonderful to see different people pursue God, but on the other, I feel really alone because I can't seem to find someone to relate to.

I'm going to Korea on the 21st of May, so the Church Search will be temporarily put to rest. I'm looking forward to seeing how Koreans do church.



*I think I've been too afraid of awkwardness. Awkwardness has become the gauge of acceptable social behaviour. Just don't get awkward and anything else you do is fine.

an infinitely-sided die would be a sphere

As a kid, I sporadically watched Ready Or Not*. Never regularly - it was hard for me to pin down when it actually showed, but these two episodes stuck in my mind. The first was an episode about a black boy working for Busy's father, and Busy's father being racist and and stupid. My conclusion: Some people are racist and stupid.

The next episode I remember... Maybe it was just a piece of an episode, but I remember Busy going to some prom and her and her dad having a beautiful father-daughter moment. And, honestly, I was confused. Isn't this the racist dad? How can he be loving when he's so prejudiced?

Now, I'm not saying Ready Or Not is wonderful TV, way ahead of its time, but even now, it's hard for me to watch TV and buy that someone can do a really bad thing and still be good. Now, we have tons of TV and film where we justify the bad things that people do (murder, theft, adultery), so we don't think they're bad anymore, but we don't usually show that people can love people so well, and then hate for unacceptable reasons.

I don't think I like to see hypocrites because they're hard to understand.

I'm coming to a point in my life where there are people I don't like. For these people, I'm so willing to write off every good thing they do as attention-seeking or fake or needy. Also, for the people I like, I can't deal with the things they do that are bad - I justify them, so I can continue liking them. But then my own beliefs get muddled. It's too hard for me to allow people to have more than one side.

Maybe things will be easier once I come to terms with my culture.



*I read earlier today in a book called Why Do Men Fall Asleep After Sex? that studies have shown that television doesn't actually rot your brain. In fact, children who watch TV from an early age have the same or greater aptitude for learning, as compared to those who don't.