Dear Brook,
Thanks for your text yesterday, and your input on the phone. You are very wise and understanding. After I talked with you, I talked with Mark. We are so conflicted about what to do about church and Rachel. I am writing you this to outline why I want Rachel to attend church (even if spirituality can’t be forced, and even if she hates church and feels “it’s just not for me”). What I am asking of you is to read this and respond honestly. I am going to present each point of why I want her to attend church, and then give a non church example to explain. The basic premise of all the points below is that all of God’s directives are intended help people find the greatest amount of joy in this life. From the moral codes (the 10 commandments and the standards in For the Strength of Youth) to the command to keep the Sabbath day holy (which includes attending church), God’s directives are for our protection and enrichment.
1. Attending church helps us feel closer to God. Attending Church is an outward and social expression of commitment to God. It says God is more important to me than the other things I could be doing with this time. Time dedicated to God improves that relationship more than time not dedicated to God.
Example: If a woman is one is never willing to be seen publicly with her husband and does not spend time with him, how good can that relationship be?
2. Attending Church reinforces good, moral standards of behavior. We need reinforcement, because we are bombarded with many contrary messages.
Example: Most teenagers question authority and seek individual identity. They do not want restrictions on them at all. They want to truly LIVE life to its fullest. Although this is good and natural, God also wants to keep them safe and help them find true happiness. Without believing and following a moral code, teenagers can really damage their future lives. If you take away the belief that moral codes are from God, following them becomes less likely. Rachel said two weeks ago, “When I leave home in 1 ½ years, I am going to try beer and have sex.” By disregarding and denying the standards she has been taught, she is racing into dangerous territory.
3. Church participation is intended increase our ability to be selfless. Life‘s happiness comes not by finding oneself, but by giving of oneself. In our church, every single person serves. It’s a layman’s church—no one gets a salary but everyone contributes to the overall success of each ward. From a social perspective, we go to church to give, not to receive, but by giving we do receive. Most wards, along with many wonderful and self-sufficient people, have some social misfits, people with serious illnesses, hypocrites and people with other challenges. Our responsibility is not to associate only with those who are like us, but to learn to love those who are different than us and are harder to love. We grow as we love others.
Example: AA: Once you are on the road to rehabilitation, you are to continue to help those struggling. This turning to others is an integral part of maintaining commitment to stay dry. In the same way, by continuing to go to church to help others, one is able to maintain a service-oriented, much safer and secure life.
4. Truths are not relative. Feelings are relative, but truths are not.
The idea that I can be spiritual on my own is denying God’s desire for us to become as one—truly loving others. There are not any individual vacuums in God’s plan. Part of God’s plan is to eliminate self-centered pride. John Donne said it this way, “No Man is an island alone unto himself. Each man is part of the continent. . . .” We are our brothers and sisters’ keepers.
Example: Dance. If a person says, “I want to be a really good dancer, but I don’t want to have to follow any rules or any instruction or be coupled with anyone else,” that person will never become a great dancer. Humility, a willingness to listen and learn is an integral part of true progress.
5. We go to church because it is right, not because it is convenient or because we want to.
Example: Rachel would love to quit high school because she does not like it—and “no one likes me there.” We will not let her because high school is a necessary launching point for opening up opportunities for her future. Rachel wants to quit going to church, but I feel church has a much greater potential for helping (and protecting) her future than any high school or college because at church we learn of eternal truths and paths to happiness that will affect every relationship we ever have and will give us boundaries that will bring us peace.
6. Some say that no one should be forced to go to church, because spirituality cannot be forced. Although it is absolutely true that spirituality cannot be forced, we do not go to church to force spirituality. We go to church to set a pattern in our life that is helpful and good. If we follow this good pattern, there will come a time when we are prepared to feel and understand spiritual things. If we have never set that pattern, we might not be prepared or in the right place to become the spiritual person we can be.
Example: When I was in college, I had to take a poetry class that I hated. We read all sorts of long and boring poems. Each homework assignment I started with a sigh. Because of the pattern of doing my homework (because I needed to get a good grade), however, sometime in the second half of the semester I came upon a poem that ignited me. I loved it! Somehow that one poem changed my whole outlook on poetry. I came to love poetry and I have passed that love on to some of my children. If I had not been forced to read a lot of poetry, I never would have come upon the one poem that changed my whole view on poetry.
7. Rachel says, “I don’t want to go to church because church makes me feel guilty.” In doing so, Rachel is blaming her own self-condemnation on the church. Our church’s purpose is to provide hope, light and encouragement, not the opposite. God’s desire is for us to accept His love and believe in ourselves.
Example: Rachel says, “School makes me feel dumb,” it’s a pattern of thinking that is in error. Two equally intelligent people could be in the same class and one could feeling stupid because s/he did not know what the teacher was teaching and the other could feel stimulated and challenged. It’s a choice of how we think/talk to ourselves, not about the forum in which it ideas are presented.
