I'm not sure how other traditions handle it, but in the church of my childhood every service began with corporate confession.
"O almighty God, merciful Father, I, a poor miserable sinner, confess to Thee all my sins and iniquities with which I have offended Thee and justly deserved Thy punishment in time and in eternity..." (Lutheran Hymnal, Adelaide, 1973 edition)
Hey, talk about self-esteem!
In fact, I can still pretty-much recite those words off by heart from the liturgy that was pounded in Sunday by Sunday at St Matthew's in Hamilton. The current version has had a rewrite, but the substance remains unaltered.
Now along comes a dude who expresses all my misgivings in one lucid piece of writing. It probably won't make sense unless you have a background in this kind of liturgical tradition, but if you do, you might find yourself muttering an 'amen' or two along the way.
Oh, that's just charming. And you were expected to repeat it every single week?! That's worse indoctrination than the church ever pulled on us, IMO.
ReplyDeleteI admit, the author of the post you linked to, lost me about a third of the way through. But the first part of the post? Exemplifies why any form of institutionalized religion is, in my opinion, a very bad thing.