Forgiving the Church?
29 10 2004
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Blogs4GodThanks Andy for this one - it’s not easy but for our health it’s necessary.
“When we have been wounded by the Church, our temptation is to reject it. But when we reject the Church it becomes very hard for us to keep in touch with the living Christ. When we say, “I love Jesus, but I hate the Church,” we end up losing not only the Church but Jesus too. The challenge is to forgive the Church. This challenge is especially great because the Church seldom asks us for forgiveness, at least not officially. But the Church as an often fallible human organization needs our forgiveness, while the Church as the living Christ among us continues to offer us forgiveness.
It is important to think about the Church not as “over there” but as a community of struggling, weak people of whom we are part and in whom we meet our Lord and Redeemer.”
~ Henri Nouwen
I think it’s not so nuch ‘forgiving the church’ but forgiving individuals that’s asked of us. Like the good old Charlie Brown strip where Lucy says, “I love the world; it’s people I can’t stand.” Funny, but true. Forgiveness and acceptance? Hard, but necessary.