Tuesday 30 June 2009

Credulity, superstition and fanaticism

Watching Jon Ronson's documentary on Channel 4 last Sunday I was reminded of an old-chestnut Unitarian Universalist joke:
At one Sunday morning service, in one of the big Unitarian churches in Boston, a man was making a rukus in the back pew. After every sentence the minister spoke he would say “Amen! Halleluia”. The minister replied, “look, this is not the Baptist Church of America. There will be time for discussion and reflection over coffee after the service”. The man protested, “but I got religion”! The minister replied, “you certainly didn’t get it here”!


I would say that as a depiction of the Alpha course, (which I experienced on route to becoming a Unitarian) it was fairly accurate. You might say I should have had some idea of what to expect, but the first time I experienced people "speaking-in-toungues" and attempting healing though the laying on of hands, it was something of a shock to the system. It is all there in The Acts of the Apostles, (should you care to look it up) but as a minister up in Manchester later pointed out, there is nothing to say that they were not speaking human languages. Of course healing ministry also goes on at Rosslyn Hill. However, it is not part of the service, and it is qualitatively different from the kind of thing done by "charismatics".


In many ways I concur with the author of this article in New Humanist, when he says Alpha is really for people who want to consolidate their existing convictions, rather than an avenue for agnostics to objectively, "explore the meaning of life".


It is interesting to consider how of the 2 million people in the UK who have tried an Alpha course a significant proportion must have made the tough and unsettling decision to walk out after deciding it was not for them. It is also interesting that my Quaker friends have adopted a remarkably "Alpha-esque" outreach course called Quaker Quest. I have heard of people floating the idea of a Unitarian outreach course (provocatively named the Omega course). This might be worth considering, given that it has been suggested new members of the Chapel be offered some kind of induction procedure. I would sign up to help run it, as long as we could use Goldfrapp's Happiness as the theme tune!
Find happiness and peace of mind! Scott

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