Tell me about your Christian church

[IdaBWells]

I am a convert from atheism to Roman Catholicism, I converted a very long time ago as a young adult and have constantly been active in my faith. I have always been very interested in other Christian denominations and churches and would love to hear about your church, your basic theology, how you worship and the size and style of your congregation. Also just generally anything you would like to share about your church that is important to you. If you would like to share please do, so we can all learn about the different flavours of Christianity as practiced by MNers.

As this is a thread for Christians to share their faith and support each other, it is not the place for any unkindness or to wax philosophical on whether Christianity should even exist. If you feel compelled to criticize Christians and their faith please start your own thread.

Hello !!
I was babtised as a child in a Methodist church . It was horrible stuffy and scary. My church now is very different and Jesus is at the heart of everything. My partner is catholic and was very shocked by our dancing praise giving service .. he loved it but missed the formality of his Catholic Church , and of course praising Mary .. we have both encountered personal tragedy and I have to say his church / form of worship led him away from God. Mine being very Jesus based has pulled me through

You all seem such big congregations. We are 10 to 20 people, occasionally 2 families with children. We are starting a choir but won't sit in choir stalls as there wouldn't be a congregation left. We are very rural so our vicar serves 4 parishes. He started about a year ago, first job as priest, and is working very hard. I moved about 2 1/2 years ago. It's a very friendly group - one of them brought some home made meals for my husband early this year when I was in hospital. He goes about half a hour away to the nearest RC church so I thought it was very sweet. *disclaimer against sexist. Hes quite capable of cooking, but he really didn't have any time and we really appreciated the kindness of a woman in her 80's who learned to cook a veggie dish specially.

My church is a Catholic parish, served by two priests currently, with one main church and two mass centres. One priest is active in a local prison, too. Average Mass attendance over the weekend is around 600 all told I think according to the stats in the news sheet.

It's a very active parish, old building with some beautiful artwork. The statue of Our Lady is white while the wall behind is decorated blue, and the effect is very striking. There's a large Keralan Catholic community there too. Nice balance between friendly and letting you pray in peace if you need to.

I love it, tbh. My place of refreshment and sanctuary.

This is so interesting! We go to a Baptist church in a city suburb. Meets in a primary school building as it was historically a plant out of a bigger local Baptist church. Team leadership of about 5 individuals as full time minister recently left to set up another venture. Being a Baptist church all decisions go through the members meeting anyway.

During the week there are housegroups, spin off groups in other venues and two community projects substantially supported. It is the most right on community focussed but also spiritually connected church we have been to for ages. We are having a hard time with our SN kids and they just let us turn up no pressure to be on rotas etc. Worship style is guitar and keyboard, average age is 40s/50s/60s. The only thing that could be improved is publicity IMO as I suspect more local Christians would come if they knew about it.

I am an attender at a Quaker Friends meeting. It's a building from the 1700s that has always been a Quaker House. About 25 people meet every Sunday at 1030 to worship in silence, unless anyone feels drawn to say something. After we have tea and a chat. My children come with me when it's a children's meeting, they spend 10 minutes or so with us in silence before they go off to their meeting, where they learn about Jesus, and stories from the Bible, or George Fox, who founded Quakerism. It's an amazing thing and I wish I had gone years ago.

Well I grew up going to a Christian church and it's one of the best, amazing mesmerises I have now being an adult. They offered music classes, tutoring, helped organise things like feeding the homeless, giving toys out to the needy during Holliday etc. During the year I was at church having piano lessons from a lovely kind woman twice a week. Then I started learning how to play the flute. On sundays we had mass, we sang songs, our pastor was hilarious and so kind. Taught us about forgiveness, respect, etc. After mass evryone would eat and have coffee, chat. It was lovely. During the holidays I would help feed the needy, I used to help with the toy give always and anything else they needed my help with. We organised car washed to help raise money too. As a hold being so busy with all these things and being exposed to helping other people made me a very humble person. I learned to respect evryone, I was taught love, I was taught to work hard. Now I'm an adult and I live in England and my relationship with god has had its ups and downs but he is forever in my heart. It's a relationship I treasure. I know the meaning of love because of Jesus. ❤️

lovely36 what a beautiful post!

slippermaiden my first connection with anything Christian (or faith of any kind as my family were atheist/agnostic) was a Quaker Summer Camp in the English countryside that myself and my brother were sent on by my mum. She was very ill with terminable cancer at the time, so I think she was actually searching and thinking about God. I was 12 I think. I really enjoyed it and almost everyone was lovely (there was just one older man who was showing way too much interest in me and my 12 yr old female friends!).

I loved sitting in silence on benches in a circle in the countryside with a light breeze. I do think that experience softened my heart to be able to recognize God later.

I’m a bit different. I’m not particularly religious (for example, my son had a humanist naming ceremony) but I do attend church every Sunday-to ring the bells. It’s in a small town, very connected to the local stately home and parts date from the 13th century. There are 10 bells (there were 8 until the 1920’s when 2 were added to pay tribute to one of the ringers who’d been killed in the Great War), but we usually only have enough ringers to ring 6. I also ring at 2 other local churches, but not for service yet. Even without religious conviction you can be comforted by the permanence of the church and help out in a practical way.

Singledad - my ds is a bellringer too, he's got involved with the young bellringers association in the diocese which is good as they have meets and ring together. He really enjoys it.

I've loved reading all these - so encouraging to hear about the diversity of us all. I'm in a CofE open evangelical church, about 450 over 3 services, loads of community links and emphasis on serving the community. DH is the vicar but I don't go just because of that: I love it there and feel very much part of it, the people are wonderful. I'm in hospital fairly often and they always make the family meals, visit me, knit me little things etc, they are so kind and generous. I feel so blessed because I really do see it as my extended family. It's dh's first incumbency but would love to settle here a while after moving round so much all my life.

Loads of young children and families, it's growing all the time which is exciting. We've recently started a group for SEND children and carers which people seem to veyr much appreciate, and it's very close to my own heart. We run groups for adults with learning difficulties and for the elderly, as well as a system of home groups and then all the youth and children's groups.

It's not perfect - people fall out, just as ever, and things can be rubbish at times. But there are tehse little glimpses of the kingdom, of how Jesus said to do stuff. And then it's great.

Worship is informal with a band, we usually have one hymn on the organ too as we do want to honour those who prefer that. Balance seems to work okay. Though not everyone happy!

I grew up loosely as a Catholic but went to the local C of E school and local C of E church on a Sunday. Like most teenagers I lost touch with all of it until I went to uni and found the most relatable and modern church. It was in an old Catholic church, upbeat worship music and full of you guys people. The leaders wore jeans, the sermons were interesting and relatable and the church literally felt like it was full of love and peace. By the end of the three years of uni, half of the sports team I played in would go, we'd all sit next to each other In our sports kit and with our coffees. The churches ethos was it didn't matter who you were, what sins you had done or what you were wearing everyone was invited.

When I left uni and returned to my home town the local C of E church didn't do anything for me. I also went to the huge happy clappy church in my city that holds 1000+ people but I just never felt like it was home. The church would always go on how good the community was but I never met the leaders, nobody would message me if I missed a Sunday to see how I was and the whole thing felt impersonal.

I'm still on a hunt for a new homely church and I'm sure I'll find it. Until that happens I'll be dancing around my kitchen listening to worship songs.