While out to lunch with some co-workers the other day, we briefly swerved our conversation into the religious terrain. The woman of our party said she hated organized religion — “no offense, Dan!” :) She was the daughter of a minister (not Concordia here), and she was turned off by how much of a hypocrite the minister was, performing behavior that was easily observed to be counter to preaching.

My immediate response went something like this: I can see how that can turn you off. The cool thing about the church I go to here, and you’re welcome to come, is that there is preaching of morality and the commandments of God, but there is also the Gospel of what Christ has done for us. Yes, we’re hypocrites and sinners, but in the end the pastor takes care to inform us that we are forgiven because of Christ.

Sometimes, I get turned off by an aspect of organized religion, even Christianity. I was flipping through the cable stations and landed on an EWTN questions and answers show. Someone had written in a question: “I was in a hospital when a minister of communion was giving communion to the sick. He asked me if I wanted to participate, and I was happy to. Afterwards, I had realized that I had just had chocolate before he asked, and I had not fasted for an hour (as is the Latin Rite’s tradition) before taking communion. Had I sinned against the fast?” The priest on TV basically said those who were sick and who were taking care of the sick had a dispensation and didn’t need to observe the hour before the fast, and as long as she was in a “state of grace,” she was OK.

I was a little amazed at the question, the necessity of the response, and the implication of the response for those not in a hospital. Holy Communion, which was given to us for the forgiveness of sins (Matthew 26:26-28), and they would deny it outside the hospital if a fast had been broken? The person who sins needs the Eucharist! Sure, St. Paul had put some rules in place about admitting someone to the Lord’s Supper, but a fast was not among the qualifications.

We are sinners. In our zeal to protect the sacredness of the faith we can put stumbling blocks in our way and in our neighbor’s way. We want to create a demand for it through false means. We turn Gospel into Law: not the good kind of Law, but the Matthew 15 kind of Law.

If you’re a regular reader, you may immediately say, “But Dan! You like liturgy and traditions! Doesn’t this undermine what you’ve posted about in the past?” No, I don’t think so. Traditions are wonderful teachers of the faith, used correctly. The liturgies we employ cement our faith to Scripture. The Latin Rite fast for this lady was not used to strengthen her faith, but to convict her conscience, forcing her to appeal to Roman legalism.

It would have been one thing for the priest to give a positive use for the fast and recommend it next time; instead, he gave her comfort through (George Carlin voice) “special dispensation.”

To my co-worker I say, not all organized “religion” is like this. There is a place that recognizes that we are sinful and unclean, in thought, word, and deed, and yet in that same place we recognize that upon this our confession we are forgiven those sins. In Williston, that place is at 1805 Main Street, at 9:30am on Sundays. :)