Pews and ports
I’ve recently become very fond of the expression “any port in a storm.” I think it sums up so much of our modern discourse, and whole sorting-ourselves-into-ideologies thing we have going on.
It reveals what Nietzsche predicted around 150 years ago. That as structures of morality start to collapse, people would rather believe in something than nothing.
There is then a task for Churches today that want to stay alive: don’t become nothing.
I’ve heard some discourse online about whether Gen Z is actually returning to religion. I’ll leave that debate for the statisticians. But I don’t think there’s much denying that the storm of cultural nihilism is well and truly here, and we are starting to look for ports.
Just look around at the online content creators who offer their own varied ports. Andrew Tate with Hedonism, for example. A port full of scantily clad women and diamond watches. But this is a modern-day siren song.
The point that confuses Churches today, and needs clearing up, is the idea that people want satisfaction. This is hardly true.
I can get as much satisfaction as I want, at any time, if we’re taking that word to mean everything non spiritual.
That is to say that in about 25 minutes, I could be surrounded by trays of sushi and bottles of wine, delivered by someone who is willing to risk running red lights to get me my stuff faster. I can satisfy most sexual urges with a few Google searches. I can rot my brain with the most mindless and vapid television known to man. After all of this I would slowly decline into a long slumber, which any onlooker would tell you is satisfaction.
It certainly would be in the animal kingdom. An animal that is well-fed, sexually satisfied, and entertained is a truly healthy beast. But we are not animals. There is an additional element to our experience: the spiritual.
Some churches are very easy. Show up, grab a coffee, sing a song, listen to a sermon about how we ought to be nicer to each other, and go home.
Some churches are hard. They are full of mystery and tradition. The commands are difficult, divine, that is to say impossible. The aims are high. They’re a challenge.
It may seem like you have to be a welcoming port, full of acceptance and goodwill to be a port worth sailing to. But real seamen would rather go back to sailing than stay there. What do you think made them set sail in the first place? A church must dare to rival the sea.
