From NorthWest:
Your recent posts about "Stealth Congregations" really saddens me. Aren't we a "Confessional" church? Does that not mean we confess? Lutherans have so many confessional statements that they require a rather large book to contain them all. Why write or copy a "Doctrinal Statement"? Surely there is plenty of material to cobble together a doctrinal statement that's easy for people to understand (like the Small Catechism, written for the masses).
My town is really suffering in this bad economy. Businesses failing. Churches closing. Empty houses in our neighborhood. The local Unitarian church needed to downsize. They bought a smaller, empty Baptist church and relocated.
I noticed something right away. The former Baptist church had one of those new type church signs. It is the kind that has a rectangle bottom in which you can letter church information along with a trite proverb. It has a triangle shape over it that mimics a church roof. What I noticed was that the triangle had been punched out with just the frame remaining. They had punched out the fiberglass because it had a cross on it.
Then I noticed something else. They had put a huge, expensive banner on the front. You see that church building has one of those big cross shapes indented in the brickwork.They did not waste time nor skimp on expense to get that cross covered. You have to admire their confessionalism. They will not for a moment have anything that is not in harmony with what they teach either in or on their church. Their church is barren of the cross -- just like a CGM church. Of course the Unitarians removed that cross so that they would not be mistaken for anything else. It doesn't matter to them if anyone takes offense. You got to admire that.
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GJ - There were no spelling errors, so he is obviously not from Church and Change.
