Jesus walks into a bar …
More younger people are delving into Christianity. But they are unlikely to worship at the altar, writes Barney Zwartz.'JESUS asked his mates to stay with him, but they got pissed and fell asleep, the bloody bastards." As an account of the disciples' failure in the Garden of Gethsemane the night before Jesus was cruci fied, it may lack the poetry and majesty of the King James Bible. But the 22 street people in a dingy city basement get the point powerfully.
This rather loose Bible reading from Matthew 26 by a young church worker, Virginia Moebus, is part of a weekly gathering in Credo Cafe, run by Urban Seed in Melbourne, a Baptist Church outreach to homeless and drug-addicted city dwellers.
Most of these people would never set foot in church, but they come faithfully to the gathering, followed by the free lunch served every day. "People see it like their living room, especially if they are on the street. It's somewhere they can come and sit down and be warm and safe," Moebus says.
But it's more than that.
It is solace, spiritual comfort, connection. They sing confidently during the service, accompanied by an extremely competent bongo drummer, and talk freely about the Bible reading.
They are part of an extraordinarily diverse and fast-growing Christian movement catering to the multitudes who reject the institutional church but want to follow its founder, Jesus Christ.
They meet in cafes, clubs, homes, halls, parks or galleries. Rather than "church", they may meet as families, students, businesspeople or surfies. They may be affiliated to mainstream churches or they may be entirely independent. Most are committed and young.
Read more by clicking the link above. This was sent to me by a missionary in Australia, Russ Matthews. What do you think about this?
