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As a spin off from Ray’s excellent post on his marriage as a metaphor with his relationship with the church, I thought it might be of value to discuss what everyone’s most important needs are regarding organized religion. By a need, I mean a benefit you need to receive to be satisfied with your organized religious experience (of any kind) I’ve posted a list of possible needs in a poll — feel free to pick up to 4 of your most important needs, in addition to making a comment if you wish. If there are needs you have that are not in the list, feel free to comment here on what your needs are…
I would certainly have answered differently 10 years ago and yet again differently 20 years ago. In my current view I don’t think I really need the church to provide spiritual experiences or even service opportunities because I have come to believe it’s really all about loving your neighbor. The church can help with spiritual experiences (I think they’re very individual, though) and the church can provide opportunities to serve – but people can also find those on their own. I picked answers to life’s mysteries, a place to grow my personal talents, programs and services that help my family be happy, and the sense I am qualifying for a better life after death. Qualifying is a bad word, but I couldn’t think of a better one — at least, preparing for a better life after this one might have been better. At one time, spiritual experiences were critical, but for some reason, I don’t trust them anymore. In a way, I’d rather not have them at church. At this point, the church is not meeting many of these very well, with the exception as a possible place to grow my personal talents if I could receive the right calling.
If you look at church as a marriage, then perhaps we can develop a list of the most important needs people have regarding their experience with organized religion. There can be follow up threads I won’t go into at this point, but they could mirror the philosophy of marriagebuilders and lead to some interesting discussion.
Other: I need a place to challenge me intellectually. A place that’s not afraid to ask me tough questions. I’m not as interested in the answers so much, I’m more interested in being exposed to things that challenge my answers and give me the space to arrive at new answers. That’s a difficult experience to have in a correlated church but I continue to experience it from time to time. Usually it takes the form of people surprising me by the love they show towards others in ways that never would have occurred to me if left to my own devices.
I also selected:
helpful programs or services that assist my family in achieving happiness: I want my family to be happy. Even if it comes at my own expense.
spiritual experiences that bring me peace: Though I might alter the language to say “arrive at a state of mind where I can find peace”
I was on the fence on:
the opportunity to serve others in a meaningful way: Right now I’m not sure whether I have anything that would be meaningful to someone else. I’m a bit broken at the moment, physically and emotionally.
Right now the LDS church and other churches I participate in are support structures of good people that serve as community, friends, and mentors in raising good decent children into good decent responsible adults. The LDS church has the added benefit to convey a sense of heritage and belonging that is shared by extended family.
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