How full is the Church?

Now.

Not Easter Sunday, but now.

NOW is the time that we see how full the churches are.

For being the church does not mean showing up on Sunday to sing old songs together, and have coffee together afterwards.

Being the church right now means showing up on Saturday to drop off a bag of groceries on the doorstep of someone who can't safely go to the store for themselves.
AND disinfecting the outside of the packages, just in case.
AND leaving before the people inside can come out to thank us, so we do not risk transmission even for that brief moment.

Being the church means NOT showing up on Monday to work, to protect the elderly and immunocompromised family members of our co-workers and customers.

The measure of the Church is not how full of people the buildings are.

The measure of the Church is how full of self-sacrificial love its people are.

Do we love our neighbors as ourselves?

Then do we love our neighbors enough to refrain from embracing them, when we miss their touch?

Do we love our neighbors enough to stay at home being bored, when we miss going out?

Do we love our neighbors enough to lose money by not working, when we desperately need money?

"Greater love has no one than this"...

Is our love great enough to lay down our normal lives for our friends?

Great enough to go ON laying them down, day after day after day, for weeks and maybe months?

By tradition the door of a church was painted red, in memory of the Passover.

Do we love our neighbors enough to stay in our own homes and wait for Death to pass over, and tell our neighbors to do the same?

Do we love our neighbors enough to heed the advice of doctors, and ignore our own deep desire for normalcy in favor of keeping each other safe?

Even if it takes longer than we can afford to wait, financially or emotionally?


Truly, when the Tempter comes, he comes offering not evil things, but good things.

He comes not offering us power to harm, or sex that exploits or betrays others, or dark forbidden magics, or even the knowledge of good and evil (for we already know what is good, but find it hard to do; we already know what is evil, but find it all too easy).

Temptation offers us no illicit delights, but the quiet delights of normal, good, and necessary things.

We are tempted by the quiet delights of going to a restaurant and sharing laughter with friends.
We are tempted by the quiet delights of taking our children to play at each other's houses while we have coffee with other adults.
We are tempted by the quiet delights of wandering around a store to buy stuff we don't really need.
We are tempted by the quiet delights of cracking jokes around the water cooler with our co-workers.
We are tempted by the quiet delights of gathering together in groups and being human together.

But to accept the Tempter's offer is, as in the beginning, to open a gateway for Death to enter the world.


If on Easter Sunday the big buildings with the crosses on the roofs are full of people embracing, and shaking hands, and singing together, and sharing a meal together, and sharing in all those necessary human things that we long to do so much that it hurts...

and thus sharing our air, sharing whatever pathogens are on our hands, sharing with the whole flock what it takes just ONE sheep, infected unawares, to begin spreading...

If we do not love our neighbors enough to endure hardships both small and great to defend the most vulnerable among them...

If we do not love our neighbors enough to be still, and wait...

Then the buildings may indeed be full.

But the Church will be

Empty.





- John M. Munzer