The Church is not a building

The Church is a community. The Church is not bricks and mortar, lath and plaster, and glass and cames. We need to be reminded of that from time to time.

I feel the need for some personal reflection on this topic. Please bear with me.

Our community is what makes our Church successful and vital. Our community gives the Church its compassion, its intellect, and its soul. Its physical structure, just like your or my physical structure, will change form from time to time - sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. But the soul of the Church determines its real character.

We seek comfort in places that are familiar to us - places we've come to love. Injury to these places feels like personal injury, and that causes us pain. Sometimes injury can leave scars - some visible and some not. Even after healing is complete, the outward scars might remind us of that pain all over again. Our compassion and intellect give way to anger and fear. Inner scars need to heal too.

So where do we find solace?

We look to each other. We're fortunate to have this community of so many caring people with whom we can share our concerns. We talk to each other, and that helps us heal - helps us get our intellect, compassion, and soul back into the right place. When we get these things in the right place and the inner scars are healed, the outward scars don't matter so much anymore.

Let's make a special effort to be kind - kind to ourselves, and kind to each other. We might feel anger when we know we should be forgiving. We might feel something has been taken from us when we know we have so much to be thankful for. We might feel vulnerable when we know we live in one of the safest places in the world. It's in our nature to have these feelings sometimes. It's not pleasant. We don't like feeling it and it's uncomfortable to hear others express it, but it's going to happen. If we're kind to ourselves and each other, we can help each other work through it.

The building is not the Church. The building is the place where the Church meets.

Till next time, see you in the building.