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| Churchgoers:
The Devout, the Insincere, and the Socialites
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Religion is an essential part of social life that accompanied
the development of all societies throughout the history of
mankind. Nowadays, the role of religion is still quite significant
though it ahs changed substantially compared to the previous
epochs. Nevertheless, there are still a lot of people who
often go to church but, now it is believed that “religion
is, rather, a human attempt to process the God experience,
which breaks forth from our own depth and wells up constantly
within us” (Ramsey 194). However, the reasons why people
go to the church may be quite different and, thus, it is possible
to speak about different types of churchgoers: the devout,
the insincere, the socialites.
First of all, it should be said that devout churchgoers are
probably the most conservative and sincere adepts who go to
church regularly. These people are really religious and sincerely
believe in God and treat the church as a sacred place where
they can purify themselves spiritually and where they morally
and psychologically relax from their social life. It should
be said that devout churchgoers basically visit church to
satisfy their religious needs as a place where they can communicate
with God, whom they share their problems with, asks for a
piece of advice through priests which they view as mediators
between God and human race.
Another group of churchgoers is totally different from the
previous one. This is the insincere churchgoers who simply
go to church for different reasons but, their major characteristic
is the lack of faith and it is even possible to speak about
certain hypocrisy from their part in regard to religion and
other adepts. As a rule, these people go to church simply
to meet certain goal that may be related to religion but this
act is absolutely insincere. In other words, an insincere
churchgoer can visit a church like a place of interest, for
instance, or to participate in some religious ceremony where
his presence is essential, for instance, if a person is a
witness during the wedding ceremony, etc. Whatever the reason
churchgoing to these people is just a routine and often useless
activity.
Finally, there are people who view the church as a place where
they can communicate with other people. This type of churchgoers
may be identified as socialites. In actuality, these people
may believe in God or not, i.e. they can be religious or not,
but this is not the main point of their going to church. They
view the process of churchgoing as a part of their social
life, as a useful social experience, or sometimes as an opportunity
to get socialized if they have some problems with the community.
Anyway, these people basically focused on communication with
other adepts or churchgoers but not on the communication with
God or fulfillment of some routine rituals.
Thus, it is possible to conclude that there are different
types of churchgoers that may differ dramatically but, nonetheless,
church is really a place that unites all these people who
go to church under different pretext and have different purposes.
In fact, the church is primarily a social institution where
people having different views may gather together.
Bibliography:
1. Ramsey, P. Basic Christian Ethics. New York: Scribner's,
1990.
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