LeFemmeGetting back to me, since it is all about ME! Today I felt a strong urge to bring my daughter to church with me, wasn't sure why because it's almost impossible to get her up before 10 on a Sunday. But we went and as we were all holding hands in our kumbaya setting, I started to feel really sick, I broke out in a cold sweat and the room started spinning. All I could do was to PRAY that the prayer would be over soon and thank God it was!
I stumbled out of my seat and out of the sanctuary, my vision blurred...didn't think I would make it to the bathroom. I was so sick I almost passed out in the stall but not before throwing up (that would have been so gross but has happened to me before in church). After about what seemed like an infinity, I mustered up enough strength to leave the stall, wash my hands and sit on a small chair in the bathroom. Sitting there another 2 minutes I remembered there were couches in the lobby, so I made my way to the lobby and collapsed on the couch next to a woman who almost immediately got up and left.
Very dazed and confused, I see people walking by me chatting, looking but never asking if anything was wrong. Finally when my hands stopped shaking, I was able to call my daughter from the sanctuary and tell her to get our neighbor (who rode with us to church) to come out and help me. It wasn't until she showed up and ask for others to help that someone got a wheelchair and brought me into their nursing station.
Wouldn't you think that if you were at a church, people would be more in tune to other people's needs? We are so self absorbed and so superficial that we don't take the time to care... unless it somehow affects us. People in church have the same issues as people outside of the church because their only reason to be there is to:
- Bribe their way out of Hell
- Feel important by being part of "ministries" which is another name for cliques.
- To be entertained in an environment that is safer and cheaper than going to a club.
Any thoughts? Do you have any examples of the 20%, where people have "supernaturally" been there to help you in your hour of need? Any ideas as to why or how we have dulled our senses to humanity. Are some people just lost or do we all have the ability to get that back? Would you want to get it back?
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8 comments:
Wow, NIkkita--are you all right? I hope so! It sounds so scary...maybe you could bring this up to your pastor as a "teachable moment" for the congregation?
I'm so glad you're ok...
If this happened in NYC I would say it's a cultural response to overcrowding that people withdraw and worry only about their own. When I lived there, if I had stopped for every homeless person I saw on the street each day I would never have made it to work and would have lost my job. People tend to put up blinders in their hustle to survive and support their families. That said, I have slipped and fallen while crossing an intersection in NYC and had two strangers run to my aid. For this to happen in Easton--and especially in a church--really surprises me. It's very troubling...
yeah, I'm feeling better now. I have endometriosis and sometimes my cysts burst which is what I've been told is the cause of my spells. Thank goodness it doesn't happen often.
But yeah, I will probably bring it up once I can find the best way to approach the situation.
I've never lived in NY so I no nothing about the culture but it just seems like if you see someone laid out on the sidewalk covered in blood, you would call 911... right?
Nikkita,I understand and have had some health problems myself so I hope you are ok.Homelessness is an ugly problem anywhere.The city of Allentown was awarded 3 million,correct me if I am wrong,to fight homelessness.The number of homeless or people in doubled up situations in Easton is a problem too.Affordable housing is at an all time low.Each day I get up I thank God for the roof over my head,no matter where I am.
Glad to know you are doing well!
I'm not a christian, so church isn't a place I spend a lot of time but I've seen good and bad in all people of all faiths including my own. Granted we have a couple of groups dedicated to helping others at our events, but we humans are a mixed bag. I know the world can seem an odd, scary and truly selfish place but I also know that isn't all there is to it. I tend to favor the "The more you put into life the more you get out" approach and that has worked for us, though granted what I put in these days isn't what I could pre-fire. Still I muddle on.
As an ordained member of my faith, having had that reaction to my own distress I would suggest having a word with your pastor, and possibly seeking out a different church or even sect of christianity, possibly another faith entirely if the situation has left you feeling alone, ignored and un-safe...
I am glad you're well. But we humans aren't all bad...I mean just look around this blog and you'll see dozens of we humans who focus outward towards the bigger things...BTW you're one of them. There are people "fighting the good fight", people who become police officers, firefighters, EMT's, people who take the worst of jobs hopefully for the best of reasons. We just had a t-shirt vendor in NY call in a possible bombing that turned out to be real, he saved lives. Oddly considering that I sometimes focus on the negative (with BPD I sometimes have little choice in the matter)...I do believe that the good outweigh the bad...though we often have to look a bit harder to find the good.
Thanks,
David
Nikkita...
I've been working 20 hrs a week at a church for a little over a year. I am not a religious person but money is money in this economy. I find the majority of the congregation to be highly intelligent, caring and very friendly. What happens to them once they are put onto boards and committees to run the church is another matter.
I am currently (and have been for months) being pressured by the powers-that-be not to talk to congregation members on Sunday. It is being couched in the rhetoric of "not part of my job description...that I should be busy with other things." My job on Sunday is supposed to be facilitating after-service festivities and make myself available for their needs. How I do that without being visible and/or talking to people is anyone's guess.
The reality is that they can't stand the idea of congregants actually communicating openly about church operations...with me or each other.
I've attended their "Town Hall" meetings and they are a fiasco. The whole place is run like a propaganda ministry...someone like me will talk to anyone about anything if they ask and I won't censure myself to meet some arbitrary standard of congregant/employee decorum.
Just today I was called in by the minister without notice and asked to sign some trumped up document (I'd call it a legal contract) that I will refrain from fraternization with the congregation on Sundays. I refused to sign anything I didn't have time to take home, read, evaluate and come up with my own response to. I also demanded a meeting with the personnel committee to discuss their issues face to face.
Organized religion in America today is no better than any other bureaucracy. If I get through this current gauntlet of church intimidation it will be on my terms. Maybe it will cost me a job down the line but I won't compromise my democratic beliefs for some phony religious nonsense.
DRL
I definitely know there are good people out there. I guess my thing has always been (especially in my example) the pastor is always trying to encourage people within the church to work together but it's impossible to do because the most of the people there are not in tune to anyone else's needs but their own. Of course there are always exceptions but it's sad when the ratio of good:crappy people in the church is the same as those who don't have a faith (or don't habitually practice it).
I know it's idealistic but I've always hoped that when you attend a function within your "faith" that you would be in the midst of the best of the best of humanity.. for the simple fact that you know they are trying to better themselves. But the real fact is, most people aren't. They put on this "friendly" front at church because they feel they have to but never move beyond the acceptable "church" behavior into becoming a person with real integrity, character and a passion for people.
David,
Believe me I've wanted to leave my church SEVERAL times in the 10 years I've been there, but I don't feel like I've been given the ok to do so yet. I'll know when it's ok, because I'll have a sense of peace about it.
DRL,
I know what your going through, it's really sad that people are like that. It's why I've stopped participating in a lot of "ministries" at my church. People straight ego trippin' when they get a little bit of "power". People like that are so used to getting away with it from so many people they don't know how to handle it when someone with sense of identity confronts them on their BS. They try to look at you with the "I don't know what your talking about" face. it's pathetic.
Ego tripping is everywhere people who have some sort of authority. Unless they also posses the ability to leave your ego at the door,and stay focused on what your gut tells you is right to do and your heart is in the right place then action occurs.But when you have somebody who has the need to control,I stay away due to the fact that it become a power struggle.And if you want it that bad,you can have the control because to me it is not worth the drama!
I guess I'm lucky in that the troublesome within my own faith tend to move on, though new converts are always interesting for the first year or two. We don't embrace concepts like sin or fear of the gods, so we don't have alot of people hanging around purely out of fear. Still we have a few here and there and I tend to avoid them like the plague, as does anyone else who's been around a while. Perhaps that's why I see more good in people on the whole. The simple normal quiet people are the largest part of our society, and the ones we don't notice much.
Still, I'm just glad you're alive and well. So hang in there,
Thanks,
David
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