"Wednesdays don't count!"

[kneedeep]

A few years ago I heard a joke about everyone waiting in line at the St. Peter's gate waiting to get into heaven. The people at the back of the line heard loud cheering coming from the front of the line. Finally the people got an answer for all the cheers, the people just ahead of them shouted "Wednesdays don't count!".

My family and friends, all of whom were CoC, just laughed and thought the joke was very funny. Looking back that seems weird, because everyone of them taught that Wed's were good and proper and if the elders scheduled you should be there. Wednesdays were one of the first to go in my slow exit from the CoC. I used a tired kid or working late as a buffer when people would ask about our whereabouts. That buffer turned into more and more about the truth that we didn't feel it necessary to be there every Wednesday.

Since leaving every now and then I realize it is Wednesday and get a strange feeling. It is nice knowing that we don't have to justify our absence to anyone any more and now it seems we have a more settled home life in the middle of the week because we are not rushing to be at church then rushing home to get a kid in bed on a school night. I suppose over time we will find something to take the mid-week study's place but that drilling from childhood to be there still rears its head from time to time.

I have stopped attending Wednesdays and Sunday nights on a regular basis. The traffic is horrible in this city and I just don't have the heart fight it again after dealing with it on the way home from work. Second, I want to relax from work. Third, its not that edifying to be there all the time. I havent' been in 2 months actually..maybe I'll go this week lol. They are not required to get into heaven.

[Kitty]

Ahhh yes, I used to wonder who decided that Wednesdays were necessary. And my grandmother was a very kind, loving soul who was a Baptist and then a long time Methodist, and she was one of the kindest, most Christ following persons I've ever known...But at the time when I was in the coc, I was really made to feel she wasn't going to be in heaven.

[ena]

Ahhh yes, I used to wonder who decided that Wednesdays were necessary. And my grandmother was a very kind, loving soul who was a Baptist and then a long time Methodist, and she was one of the kindest, most Christ following persons I've ever known...But at the time when I was in the coc, I was really made to feel she wasn't going to be in heaven.

The CoC is very concerned with pleasing God. That's noble but the cost is a bunch of religious gyrations that have nothing to do with pleasing God and actively creating sins that don't exist. For example in my church denominations were condemned. Are they evil or are they a different expression of Christianity. If you look you will find Christians there. The trouble is that no one in the CoC looks. Does the CoC know the mind of God. Clearly they do not and are not given the right to judge others. I wonder what God will have to say about losing his job to the CoC. The problem is that the Catholics, Orthodox and denominations are what remains of the original church. Constantine had the idea that there should be one church. He lived 300 years after Jesus died. He rolled up the Gnostics, Ebionites, Marcionites into one. He destroyed many of their writings. Some have since come to light from buried stashes. This is the only way we know about them other than complaints from early church fathers. Much of this is written in Greek, Coptic and Syriac. Did the gates of Hell prevail against the Church? It leaves you with a decision that either Jesus was a poor prophet or the CoC does not see it.

[Struggler]

During the summer, it's fun in a perverse way to get home early, sit on the porch with a cold beer and bare feet up, watching harried neighbors rush off to church.

Understand completely!! Sundays too, for me......no church.

Made that break, too. Isn't it wonderful?