Have church 3 times on Sunday and on Wednesday? I'm just wondering where this tradition comes from. Also why do they judge you if you only go on Sunday morning, and make you feel like a dinner if you don't go every time the doors are open. 
Well, depends on the church but my answer is I think it's to keep $ coming in. If you pass the plate every service you get more $.
Seriously though, the more you can get people to commit to the agenda the more vested they feel and the less likely they are to bail, they'll give more cause they're more emotionally invested in what's going on.
Just my take. I have no basis for this just anecdotal evidence lol.
What Grakman said, also, they have to justify their existence and the buildings, budgets and staff. An economically sound church would rent on sunday and have small groups through the week. seems like people get the most out of small groups. As to why? just tradition I guess.
I think some churches also have Sunday evening services; especially Catholic ones right? I'm assuming it's not out of tradition and just merely a way to get people to go who might otherwise sleep in on Sunday morning.
Interesting thing I was told by a Brazilian is that in Brazil it is mostly only old ladies and children that attend mass on Sunday mornings. Everyone else who does go to church usually ends up going on Monday. Don't know how true that is though.
Ridge, what tradition or denomination are those churches in Africa where they are turning people away?
Many warlords in Africa tie wierd pentecostal beliefs to their mass slaughter. Go figure.
Some friends of mine go to a church with 3 Sunday services because the church membership has grown so much they had to add a second and the a third service to fit everyone in the building.
In the first century... They attended ws everyday.
Twice a week isn't a stretch...
Wednesday is not the same as Sunday...
Ridgeback -Grakman - Ridge, what tradition or denomination are those churches in Africa where they are turning people away?
I think some are Pentecostal. Charismatic churches are growing like wildfire in Africa, South America, and parts of Asia. I remember some Oxford lecturer talking about it but I can't recall the denominations exactly.
They are penecostal/full gospel/charismatic...whatever label you want for spirit based church, and the reason they are growing so much there is, here in America, we don't need God or his workings of miracles, we can "take care of ourself".
Breed, is the implication of your post that those in Africa rely on God because they do not have the material means to take care of themselves so they're relying on God to help them, or that Americans have rejected God? Or both or something else?
Grakman - Breed, is the implication of your post that those in Africa rely on God because they do not have the material means to take care of themselves so they're relying on God to help them, or that Americans have rejected God? Or both or something else?
I'm saying both. Some of the poorer of Africa have only god to lean on, so they, almost by default, have faith to take Jesus at his word
while we here in America are so used to having everything already we are not in the habit of depending on god for our very lives.
Most of the people mentioned in the bible that had miraculous encounters with Jesus were at the end of their rope, and that is what it takes most of the time for us humans to let go of preconceived expectations and let him do his thang
Just my two cents
Sunday evening services began in the USA because the so-called Blue Laws requiored bars to be closed on Sunday nights. Since these were the days before television & radio, evengelical preachers thought that if they offered Sunday evening church services then non-christians would go to chruch simply out of having nothing else to do.
I dont think alot of people realize the uniqueness of American Evangelical Christianity and its form or operational methods came to be in the early 20th century. Before then, I don't believe there was such a thing as bow your heads and raise your hand or walking the aisle, or as the Tent Evangelists called it, the Sawdust Road.
A great novel to read on the transformation is Elmer Gantry. I've often thought of modernizing Elmer Gantry in novel form.
zealot66 - I dont think alot of people realize the uniqueness of American Evangelical Christianity and its form or operational methods came to be in the early 20th century. Before then, I don't believe there was such a thing as bow your heads and raise your hand or walking the aisle, or as the Tent Evangelists called it, the Sawdust Road.
A great novel to read on the transformation is Elmer Gantry. I've often thought of modernizing Elmer Gantry in novel form.
Very true, something I've only recently come to understand.
There's a guy from the OLD days of the internet who went by the handle Datarat. He's very much Reformed in his thinking, and used to take every oportunity to criticize "the American Religion."
It was then I started to see how John Wesley, trained in the Reformed tradition at Oxford, began interprating the bible in light of his own experiences once he migrated to America. This lead to the Methodist church and Wesleyan theology. That lead to the evangilistic work of Charles Finney, and from there to the whole experience-based Charasmatic Movement.
(BTW, not all charasmatics are charasmaniacs.)
Elmer Gantry was written by Sinclair Lewis as a scathing inditement of organized religion in general. He had several "friends" who were ministers. He earned their trust, and they passed along inside information on a few scandles and gossip, most notably the doings of a female evangilist named Aimee Semple McPherson. These Lewis adapted into the story of Elmer Gantry, a drunk whoes main goal in life is to avoid working an honey day's work in his life.
BTW, most of the practices of "American Evangelical Christianity" can be traced back to Charles Finney in the early 1800's. Oddly America had its greatest revival under Reformed teacher & pastor Jonathan Edwards in the mid 1700's.
Yes, I studied Elmer Gantry and how it came to be. I live in kansas city and that is where he spent a year studying and putting together his portrait of ministers. If the walls could tell stories.... That preacher lady, I saw a documentary on her. She was quite the deal. This whole 'evangelist' thing in America. There is one lady REV. Scott who did a porn before she married this old minister Scott in LA. She writes in Greek and Hebrew on the board. Quite interesting how far people go to be Elmer Gantries.
"There is one lady REV. Scott who did a porn before she married this old minister... Quite interesting how far people go to be Elmer Gantries"
Let's not condem. I don't know who that woman is, but God loves porn stars too. It's possible one got saved and turned her life around.
I guess....