Chandler Christian Church

The following is pasted directly from my blog on MySpace. I am trying to consolidate my blogs.

Last Sunday, March 27th, I decided to go solo. I considered the notion of returning unannounced to my friend's Baptist church. I was also very interested in attending services at the local Buddhist temple. In the end, I chose another mega-church. The Baptist church was too far away and my sons wanted me to wait on the Buddhist thing until they were free to go with me (they were busy butchering a sheep that morning).

That left me with the Chandler Christian Church which happens to be located right next door to Cornerstone. There are so many Christians bogging down traffic that attend those two churches that the City of Chandler assigns local police officers to direct traffic in and out of the church parking lots.

With traffic in mind, I arrived about twenty minutes early, got a decent parking spot and had time to walk around a little. After a short, self-guided tour, I entered the theater/chapel about 10 minutes early. I was surprised to find the room virtually empty. That was a little surprising considering the size of the room. I couldn't help but think that attendance must be dwindling.

I was wrong. Within twenty minutes, the room was almost packed and more people were sneaking in. Apparently, tardiness is not frowned upon in this congregation and that was actually a comforting thought. The general tone of the meeting was casualness. There were shorts and sandals and jeans and tank tops but most people were excited and enthusiastic. The worship band was on stage and everyone was standing and waving their hands like they were at a Motley Crue concert. People were singing along (which wasn't difficult because the lyrics were displayed on the big screen).

There were a couple times when a song could be construed as emotional and that did not surprise me. I think it was Dan Barker who explained that as a music leader at his church, it was his job to get the congregation in the "spirit" of things. He understood that even secular music can be used as a powerful tool to make you feel a certain way. They do it in movie soundtracks all the time. They can make you feel really happy or sad or scared with nothing but notes.

The interesting thing is that the pastor wasn't the speaker that day. He got on staged and thanked God for such powerful music. He then gave a prayer to the Lord and introduced the speaker. His name is Vince Antonucci and he wrote a book called "I Became a Christian and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt: Replacing Souvenir Religion with Authentic Spiritual Passion". The weird thing is that I didn't see anything authentic or spiritual or passionate.

Vince delivered a canned performance that came off more like comedy for Christians than anything significant or spiritual. He told a (likely bogus) story about being raised with no religion. He claimed that college was the first place he ever met a Christian and how he made fun of televangelists on TV. One day, he wanted to read a passage in the Bible to prove Christians wrong and he kept reading it.

Allegedly, the Bible gave convincing evidence of Jesus' divinity by providing places and times and people that were historically significant. From that day on he was a Christian and so the story goes. Well, his big message of the day was that everyone was afraid to die and that we were all born to die. According to the words of Jesus, those who love this life will lose it and those who hate this life will gain it. The Bible is full of little gems of wisdom that are always contradictions of conventional thinking. The misconception is that since they profoundly defy logic they must also be profoundly wise.

I truly have little respect for the speaker because he was propagating bullshit and I'm sure this mega-church paid him a pretty penny to fly all the way over from North Carolina just to tell people they had to die to really live. Don't get me wrong, I fully understand the implications of the message; I just think it is stupid. People should be embracing life because it might be the only life they have to live.

I feel sorry for these Christians who delude themselves with a few hours of lies each Sunday. Most do not take the time to truly study their own scriptures (the quickest way to atheism is to actually read the bible). They are content to propagate whatever fallacies their pastors give them. They rationalize that they do not need to bother studying their faith when they have a preacher to do it for them. Oh, they might memorize a key scripture or two but it all becomes lost in blind faith.

I suppose that's what you get with a mega-church: insincerity and emptiness. Everything becomes watered down. I suppose it seems odd that an atheist would care but it has an adverse impact on our culture. People no longer believe because they have taken the time to search for the sacred truths themselves. The danger occurs when Christians in America need to rally the troops. Most of these people have no clue about the issues let alone where they should stand. All they know is that they identify as Christian and the religious right gains mindless masses.

Well, somehow my review of the church has turned into a rant. I intended to keep these blogs on an even keel but it becomes increasingly difficult to ignore the obvious. Christian churches are nothing more than a place where professed Christians can take refuge from the secular world and find out what they are supposed to think. I really need to go to some non-Christian churches to get some perspective before I get completely burnt out on this whole project.