Guarding the church

The church in Lot Bo Kanal (Haiti) is always locked.  When they unlock it for church or kid's club meetings, it is guarded by a woman who stands at the door with a stick- beating away anyone poorly dressed or sick.  The children scramble around her feet, peering in under the door, or clinging to the bars on the windows to see what is happening inside.  She held her little stick in her right hand and barred the entrance.  

"Isn't that the most atrocious thing?" a friend commented soon afterward.  Who would bar the church?  Who would chase the children away with a stick and demand that they dress up or clean up before they could come?  One little boy actually wore a dress to kid's club because he didn't have any other clothing to wear.  She let him in.

So that made me think about the doors of the church.  Do we stand with a stick beating people away?  Imagine a dirty, angry, half-naked crowd standing around outside the doors of your own church.  You know they just want to come inside for the free stuff you are handing out- or maybe they just nothing else to do that day and this is the closest thing to entertainment they have seen in a while.  

Some of them are smoking.  A few have 40s in their hands.  Their gravely voices carry over the steeple spewing coarse jokes and irreverent laughter.  They smell like body odor and will definitely get mud on the floor.

Can they come in?

What about a man who doesn't take his hat off during prayer?  

What about a known "druggie?"

What about a woman who shows too much cleavage?

What about an ill-disciplined child?

Think about it.

until soon,

b.