Decision time

I'm not a person who deals well with change. I avoid it whenever possible, and I delay it as long as I can. Even when I know it's going to be good for me, I procrastinate. This is probably one of my most frustrating qualities (certainly to my wife), but even to myself.

The big change I've been resisting lately has been to leave our church home.

I've changed churches twice in my life, and both were related to a change of residence. Both times were somewhat awkward because of the need to meet new people and learn new customs and accommodate slight variations in the liturgy. The Lutheran church, much like the Catholic church, leans heavily on an organized liturgy, which makes the general order of worship very consistent between congregations.

We've been members of this congregation for six years, and had two of our children baptized there. Our kids have done bible school there every year since our oldest was three, and it's the only sunday school they've ever attended. We've also made some good friends in our time there who have encouraged our growth in faith.

In the last year or two, though, we've felt increasingly called away from our church. Much of the problem lies in the progressively shrinking membership. Enrollment at our church, like many small mainline congregations across the country, has been sliding for some time. We've alternately attributed this to intra-congregational strife, bad seeds, poor organization, poor advertising, forgetful membership, an economic downturn, and competition from more contemporary megachurches. I've come over time to doubt that any of these was truly a cause, and some were mostly imagined.

Whatever the cause, the result has been that the sunday school has declined from 8-10 or 10-12 kids in a class to 3, 4, or 5 kids in a class. As the number of students has decreased, the number of parents willing to be involved has also fallen.

The same symptoms have hurt the nursery, which has existed only sporadically. There aren't many families with children younger than sunday school age who have a need for a nursery, but we invariably have one of our own - and for the last two months another. Our youngest son, who is threeish, doesn't belong in a worship service once the sermon starts, and an ambulatory foster child who's never been to church belongs there even less.

With little congregational support for the nursery lately, our options have been to leave worship after communion or to have one of us sit in the nursery every week. That didn't seem so bad when we were taking our second or third child out. Now that it's the fourth... and the fifth... We believe we've been called by God to be foster parents of young children. Should we assume He does not mean for us to be in church?

The idea of leaving is complicated by the fact that there aren't other Lutheran churches nearby that are attractive at first glance. That means we've had to consider other denominations, which is a particular hurdle for me. My grandfather was a Lutheran minister his entire life, and I grew up in the church where he baptized me - the same church where I was confirmed and where I later married my wife. Leaving that church was difficult, but staying was simply impractical because our home was in the city twenty miles away, and there were half a dozen churches within a 10-minute drive. This time around, I'm afraid moving outside the Lutheran church will be a lot like abandoning family. The liturgy, the hymns, the history... It's not part of my faith exactly, but it's part of me nevertheless.

No evidence of a young boy wrapped in a red towel was found

"Rare Meteorite Found in Kansas"

OK. Not that rare.

Haloscan comments

Found a link to The Logical Philosopher with some explanation of how to show Haloscan comments and trackbacks. Working on getting those implemented in my limited spare time, so if your comments have disappeared, that's why. Also helps to explain the infrequent posts.

When it's all done, the Blogger comments won't show at all.

blog tech

Pwned, 6-0

Kenny Rogers and the Tigers over The Big Unit, that is.

8K's and 5 walks, vs 4K's and 5 earned runs. And did you see the line drive to Rogers's head, which he knocked down in time to make the play?

Nobody thought Rogers or the Tigers could perform like that. Well, maybe noone outside Detroit.

Tigers

Sheesh

Stop the ACLU says:

• The ACLU thinks that parents have no right to know if their pregnant underage daughter is seeking an abortion.

• The ACLU believes anyone, for any reason at any time should be allowed to abort a child.

• The ACLU opposes abstinence education.

• The ACLU has fought to have constitutionally-sound displays that include the Ten Commandments removed from public property.

• The ACLU is on record as supporting polygamy.

Sure glad they're standing up for all our rights, eh?

Hat tip to Conservative Thinking
Tags: ACLU

Recently

After two months of night classes, my wife and I were licensed to be foster parents this summer. Last week, we received our first long-term placement: a bright, adorable, attractive one-year-old girl.

Only thing is, she screams bloody murder when I walk into the room. With my wife or with the kids (especially our oldest) she's fine, but she has no use for adult males unless there's no women around.

Now I'm a big boy, and I can handle it. With four other kids in the house, it's not the first time a baby didn't want to be held by me. And it isn't even truly that she doesn't want me to pick her up, because she'll reach for me if no one else is there: she just prefers to be held by women. But she looks terrified when I pick her up.

Could be nothing. Maybe she's just not spent that much time around male family members. Or maybe it's more than that. I know I'm a stranger to her (and moreso than the rest of the family because of work) and that I'm just projecting here, but I can't help be angry at a world in which a little girl is terrified that she would be left alone with a man.


Tag: foster

Bach'n it

My wife took our oldest out of town for the rest of the week, and today was my first full day alone with the other three kids. Forgot how much I always liked the smell of Play-Doh.

Oh, come on. You do too.

Twenty years later...

... (and a handful of abominable VHS tapes in our library) and I can still correct some of our kids on the names of the Care Bears. There must be something more useful those neurons could be remembering.

Quite a week

Father's Day was great. The oldest kids hand-made a birdhouse and painted a storage container for me. They put a lot of work into it. I'm really blessed to have kids so eager to show their love. Also got this which I've been listening to back and forth to work all week. Watched Walk the Line a month or so ago, and it got me hooked.

Also, YD had her dance recital on Sunday. Her mom, big sister, and Grandma went to see, while I watched the boys. She loves to perform for people, when she's in the mood. The upshot is, she really enjoyed dance, which means another year of lessons. It's nice to see her have an activity she enjoys though, that's different from what her older sibs do. It's strange how different four kids can be.

Yesterday a huge storm system passed through here. I'm told we made the national news. Longest day of the year according to the calendar, but it looked like early evening all day long when it wasn't raining. Thunderstorms here, with lots of flooding. Tornados elsewhere in the area. We got 4 inches of rain at the house, and about 3/8" on the floor at one end of the basement. It scared the kids a little, I think. We were mostly worried about the new drywall, but glad we hadn't gotten to carpet yet. At the office this morning, the parking lot was flooded until after 10am.

Today is our 10th wedding anniversary. I love my wife, and I give thanks to God for her. Only He knows where I'd be without her. She observed earlier this week what a long time ten years is. That's something you hardly have any appreciation for when you get married in your early twenties. We were relatively mature when we got married, but even so we had a lot of growing up to do. I'm quite certain it's only by grace that marriages last 'til death do us part.

Tag:what's going on

Sign that the end is near.

I'm watching shows (as I work in the evening) during which they run advertisements for bail bonds. Their slogan: "You call, you walk."

Color me disturbed.