dada, "What's a Church?"

What, why, and how come, are the questions of the day that give entry into the world. A few times now we've encountered churches - there's that cute little onion domed greek orthodox church on capitol hill for example, - so that I've heard the question "What's a church - Was ist eine Kirche?" more than once. It's hard to explain god to a 3 year old, much less the structures of organized religion, so I've always told her I would take her someday. That day was yesterday.

Actually, we've tried on a few other occasions, but the churches were always locked. In Europe, this would be unheard of, where accessibility to god's sanctuary is 24/7.

Religion has always fascinated me - how can it not with its elaborate rituals and attempts to address the fundamental existential questions of humanity - but at the same time, I could never choose a religion out of the simple fact that each one implicitly states that they are the way, which automatically sets up opposition, and contributes to the strife and devisiveness of the world. The world is littered enough with religious wars. I'd prefer not to contribute, but would rather just practice what they all preach, peace.

I don't go to church very often, but I like the idea of it, especially in a St. Francis sort of way, nature being by far my preferred cathedral. The wilder the better, so as to invite as much of gods creation as possible. Today though, that was more than a tricycle ride away, not to mention a bit beyond our immediate mission, which was to go to a church built of walls. We ended up going to St. Peters, the closest church within tricyling distance. The congregation, as it turns out, is predominantly philipino-american, very much a Beacon Hill church, though when the pastor launched into his sermon, I wasn't so sure I was in a church...

He talked of the air we breath, pollution, the melting ice caps, the degradation of the waters of the puget sound and the duwamish, and how we, the "civilised" people, who took the land from the indians, are now raping that land, our land. Those were his words. I was stunned. It was beautiful to hear the ugly truth, because we so rarely do - not from our leaders, not in our schools, and only rarely in our daily business-as-usual lives. And not least because we're so busy being civilised... and here was this message coming from an institution that had participated in the "civilising" of the indians. He went on to talk of the dismal state of health care and how not voting, in our country, was simply irresponsible. When he was done with his sermon I had an impulse to start clapping, but this was a church, so the pastor solemnly sat down, and after a few more moments of silence everybody got up and sang a hymn. I liked the part where everybody turns around and greets those they're sitting next to. I wasn't sure what was going to happen after the service was over. I was kind of hoping there'd be a gathering. An opportunity to meet and talk. But mostly everybody just filed out and into their cars. Or in our case, onto a tricycle.

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