Toilet Roll Covers

If you visit The Wife's grandparents' house... and take a moment in their loo... you'll see, sitting on the window sill, a toilet roll in a pretty, pink toilet roll cover.

When I was a child... I remember making a toilet roll cover - it was designed to look like a poodle.

I say designed because no-one, surely, actually thinks that a real poodle looks like this: 

At the time, I didn't really understand what the point was - and I still don't. Being a straightforward kind of chap, I quite like my toilet roll to look like a toilet roll...

Oh, and... as the father of a child who is gradually learning what things are, I'd hate her to get things mixed up and assume that she could draft into service any other pink animals that might happen to wander through our bathroom.

Sorry... I digress.

And so to church... where there are a number of things that I don't really see the point of... affectations that we seem to accept as quite normal, but that I can't help but think are - at best - not very useful. 

So here are my top ten Church toilet roll covers... (and to those who know me well, note - action songs are not included...)

10. Singing songs in foreign languages - For some, singing in a foreign language is a reminder of the sights and sounds, the smells and tastes, the experiences of being somewhere completely different - perhaps somewhere where God touched them deeply. For them, it's all about memory... For those without the memories, though, it doesn't mean much... I know that God understands Xhosa, or whatever language it might be... but we might as well be singing the Ying Tong Song without the faintest promise of the light-relief raspberry-solo-trumpet bit in the middle. 

9. Saying anything else in foreign languages - We all know what 'Amen' means... it means "the prayer's over now, please open your eyes". At least it's easy to spell... unlike 'Hallelujah'. Actually... the best argument for actually using these is one I saw that suggested that we should say 'Amen' because Jesus did... so presumably he spoke English the rest of the time? 

8. Worshipful aerobics - Please stand, please sit, please stand again, please sit again... women please stand to sing the third verse... men please stand to sit down again... I don't mind standing or sitting... but can I do one or the other... or perhaps have a choice? What I struggle with is feeling like I've stumbled into Kellogg's Battle Creek Sanitarium, where my ability to achieve the correct attitude depends largely on my physical upness or downness... 

7. Worshipping Gaaahd - When I was a kid it was cool to pretend you were an American... What can I say, it was the 70s. It's apparently still cool to pretend you're American if you're leading worship... I can accept that the 'o' in God gets stretched when singing... "How great... is our gaaahd"... but hearing a British worship leader come out with a spontaneous 'Yes Gaaahd' in the quiet bits between songs makes me look around to see if the Dukes of Hazard have just walked in. 

6. Instructions, for the good of the event - Please come in, please sit towards the front, please move into the centre of a row, please turn to chapter, please wait before drinking so we all drink together...  I'm not advocating anarchy, but if our Sunday services weren't largely front-led and ceremonial, we wouldn't need to be directed like sheep gone astray.

5. Calling Lord Lord... Lord... Lord... - I don't ever remember having conversations with my dad at home that went "dad, you know dad, that football game dad, on tv dad, that I wanted to watch dad? well dad, can I have some friends dad, over to watch it dad, with me dad?"... but that's how we sometimes talk to God. I've wondered whether we repeat ourselves when we pray because we've maybe forgotten who we're talking to...

4. Phony bread breaking - OK, it's petty, but it must be a damn fine crust on that loaf if you have to rely on the ecclesiastical version of lip synch to make sure you can break it live on stage at the right time... every time.

3. Referring to the 'original Greek/Hebrew' - un prof du grec du nouveau testament m'a repris il y a pas longtemps d'avoir fait exactement cela... il avait raison... pour ma part j'aurais du (mais je ne l'ai pas fait) lui dire que si, lui, avait fait sa job comme il fallait, on n'aurait point besoin d'y faire reference... sorry, I had that thought in French originally - irritating isn't it? We've got about 100 translations of the bible... are they all that rubbish that only those able to read in the 'original' can really understand the word of God? 

2. Reading things out loud together - A personal bugbear, I know... but there's a clear rhythm to reading out loud with others that means that it's less about the content, and more about the pace... Solemnly chanting things that we don't think about has never really equated in my mind with anything useful, and having been the chump who tries to actually read the passage normally and ends up confidently delivering a word into utter silence... I can't help but sit/stand in silence and let others get on with it now.

1. Formulae - OK, I know others will object to my objection... but this is the thing that really gets up my nose... What better way to divide those who are 'in the know' from those who aren't. "This is the word of the Lord... thanks be to God"... "body of Christ, broken for you"... Every time I hear something like that and am invited to give the 'correct' response, it makes me feel like I've been asked for the password to a select club... which automatically excludes those less favoured.