Part 1: The Church - An Introduction

Can I be really honest with you? Truly and completely honest?

This topic is a difficult one for me to approach. Being raised in the church, I feel a loyalty to it. However my experiences within the church make me want to flat out rage. So here goes my attempt at explaining exactly what I'm thinking, and feeling.

Have you ever googled your name? Just to see what comes up? If you are someone that is fairly well known, you can usually get a sense of what is thought about you through people's searches of particular traits and questions simply by adding the word 'is' after your name. It gives you an idea about what the greater world thinks of you.

So I did the same with Christianity. I typed 'Christians are' into google, and this is what I got.

Or how about 'Christianity is'? 

To me, this is not only heartbreaking but truly unfortunate. Something I grew to love over the years has become tainted, not only for others in the greater worldwide community but for myself as well. Within those 18 phrases, only two of them I wish to be true, although probably about nine of them really are. But I'll get into that. This is the beginning of a series of posts. I find I get rather long winded about these topics so I have broken them down into a few posts, just so I don't bore anyone to death.

This isn't going to be pretty. I'm not going to hold back and be kind. I'm going to be honest. If that offends you, feel free not to read it. I'm not doing this for you. I'm doing this for me.

The following posts, spread out over the next week or two will be as follows:
1) My experience with the church (The Past)
2) Where the church is failing (The Present)
3) My take on all things Christian and God (The Future)

I ask you to remember that there are three sides to every story. Yours, mine, and what actually happened. Ask the other people involved in my stories what happened, and doubtless there would be a different story for each person involved. However these particular ones are my stories, thoughts, feelings and memories. I would never venture to say that I have the straight of what has gone down over the years, however I'm very clear on my perception of how things happened, and i think when you get right down to it, that's all that really matters. How we perceive situations and experiences is how we remember them, and shapes who we are and how we react in future situations.

As always, I welcome discussion and respectful debate. However please don't judge too critically until you read the entire series. Sometimes you need to see the whole picture to understand what one is trying to accomplish.