Does the church cultivate loneliness? Rosaria Butterfield says yes.
She believes that we declare ourselves independent of each other in our culture and, unfortunately, in our churches. Once upon a time there was the church, that of the multitude of those who believed, it was a heart and a soul. No one considered it exclusively, as his own or for any of the things he possessed; But was it all in common for them?(Acts 4. 32). They shared time, shared food, shared goods, shared identity, were they the first church?A family united by the blood of Jesus.
- However.
- Many of our churches today have left behind this image of God’s family.
- Culture? Absolutely weak or non-existent in God’s family?The contemporary Western church has fostered an unprecedented worsening of loneliness.
- With single women particularly buried in the background.
I interviewed Rosaria Butterfield, author of The Gospel Comes with a House Key, which addresses the issue of co-dependence. Speaking of friendship and limitations, we limit ourselves to loneliness, especially among single women.
“Single women,” she says, “do a kind of deep-sea diving that married women don’t. “When you’re married, someone holds your ankles when you’re suspended over an abyss. There are these single women, and there’s no one, who’s going to hold your ankles?It is a powerful illustration of what Rosaria calls a “crisis of loneliness. “”We [the Church] create the problem and now we ask the bachelors to find the solution,” Rosaria says. “To tell a single woman that she is already alone to take responsibility for setting boundaries in relationships “is not understanding the problem.
“We must do something about this culture of isolation and lack of God’s family in the church. She says, “Desperate people make idols. ” If we overcome despair, perhaps the Church strives not only to destroy idols, but also to prevent them. .
So how do we practically cultivate the culture of Acts 4, a heart and a soul, in God’s family today?Can the Church change its functioning often alone and sometimes together, often together and sometimes alone?
? A heart and soul can begin with a house. Rosaria boldly appeals: “Most families should live with singles in the church. “She continues: “Your goal, as in parenting, is not to create dependence, but to help people Is community life a short-term arrangement for moments in life when a faithful presence is required?In his opinion, discipleship must arise from the functioning of the Christian family.
Rosaria describes several advantages for the covenant family when opening their doors: (1) many in the church can have intimacy and secure relationships; (2) reduces the need for church intervention or counsel because more problems are treated organically in the community; (3) puts healthy pressure on a marriage to be a pious marriage and not to resort to “living together as roommates”; and (4) visually represents God’s family.
We can cry together. We can rejoice together, we can carry the burdens together. Can we live life together? Because we’re already together, can’t you earn more by having everything in common?(Acts 4. 32) only to share the living space and everything it contains with brothers and sisters in Christ. After all, one day, as Christ’s collective wife, everyone has a place of residence with our God. Forever (Revelation 21. 3).
But Rosaria encourages us to function as God’s family, even when we do not live under the same roof. “At this table, we have many singles in the church who do not live with us. They come, they have dinner, we have devotions, and do we [understand] where people are [spiritually]?The scriptures establish this union of the body marked by “day after day” meetings, attending church, praying, and leaving bread in our homes (Acts 2. 42-47). and must be opened at a steady pace to feed hungry souls and bodies.
Does a heart and soul require an active reminder that we share an identity. When we celebrated my eldest daughter’s fourth birthday, we had a party for the children and their parents. Almost everyone came in our small group, and none of them had children. They were all single.
For most of the life of our small group, we were the only married couple. Have our children been a role model for us in what God’s family looks like when they receive and interact with our brothers and sisters as they walk through the door?the youngest twentysomethings, until the 1970s. For them, each person has a name, an identity, a talent and a personality. For them, as it should be for us, we have everything in common: Jesus.
So what should our small group communities look like?Rosaria tells us about the psalms of pilgrimage (Romagna):
Think about what it would be like to make this pilgrimage to Jerusalem. It is a community effort, and in this community there are very small and very old people. There are people who can’t walk alone and there are people to carry. There are people who carry other people. There are friendships of different ages and all kinds of differences and yet we all head towards Jerusalem. And that must be the model of our Christian family of God, that we may all move towards this New Jerusalem.
Rosaria vigorously warns against small homogeneous groups, especially those who are separated by age, sex, time of life, or who fight common sins. “What single women need is no longer single women. What young families need is no longer young families?Because? Rosaria continues: “Small groups organized by sociological category really weaken relationships to bridge differences in a church. And does that weaken our ability to really serve each other?
Rosaria encourages us to “leave room for real and organic friendships”. Christ is our communion and we are members of his body. And when we manifest our unity through blood by interacting through our differences, we do not serve one another alone; we give the world an image of authentic fraternity and of those who give it power.
? A heart and soul must be a coherent mission throughout the church. For small churches, Rosaria says that cultivating a family culture of God can be done more naturally. But for those of us in the largest churches, the elders must lead the way. to determine how the correct types of relationships will be established and maintained. Here are some ideas Rosaria offers pastors, elders, and church leaders as we grow in our family lifestyle of God.
1. Provide homes you receive during the holidays Rosaria recommends:?Are there churches places that greet others during the holidays?Howeverpreguntas. no invitation is needed. In large churches, could this initiative force church leaders to compile a list of open-door members on holidays and ask people to register to join them?A formal start at an organic pace along the way.
2. Encourage small groups to act as families. Small groups tear down the walls of large churches in family homes. They are often the means by which we experience fraternity, respond to the needs of ministry within the church, gather ideas, and achieve evangelization in our neighborhoods and cities. three are needed:
We will ask you to be brothers and sisters in the Lord, will we make sure that while we serve the Lord together, that we go there and have difficult conversations, we have had a lot of time to play cards among us?Or put together a puzzle on the dining room table, that we really know each other at this level.
We put our projects and our time at the foot of the cross, not only for the external ministry in the community, but because we knew each other well, we have game nights, we eat unwanted food and we give time to go. to the children’s bed (and ours) for communion, just as we do so by studying the word of God and the commitment of the unbeliever world around us.
3. Promoting neighborhood-based intimacy No matter how strange Rosaria’s vision is for church families, we can all take steps forward, especially if we start dreaming and praying with church members in our neighborhood. Many of his advice assumes we don’t live far away. Regular food exchange, preaching, recreational activities, and missionary life in the community often requires closeness.
So, a convenient way to promote is to simply find out who goes to your church and lives near you.
Does the church cultivate loneliness? Perhaps. In any case, there is a call here for all of us: that through our faithful prayers, our listening and our obedience, our daily life and our ministry represent the reality of a heart and soul of the church, the true family of Dieu. Et for those of us who feel that God’s family is an inaccessible reality, Rosaria sums up our way forward : “Do what you do and open our arms even more”.