Still puzzled

I am still puzzled by a phone call I received last week. It was from a writer at one of the local towns' paper. This coming weekend in Granum here, there is a Gospel Jamboree. This is the 12th annual Jamboree. It brings in over 1000 people to our small town of Granum. There are different groups that perform Friday night, All day Saturday and then on Sunday we have an interdenominational service. Generally speaking this is well received for the most part.

The thing that I am puzzled about is the questions the writer was asking me. He began by asking me some general information about participation and how our church was helping out. (We offer a free pancake breakfast on the Sunday morning.) At first I thought he was just looking for some information, but then he started to ask some questions about the speaker for the Sunday morning service.

The speaker this year is Bishop Fred Henry from the Catholic Church. Bishop Henry is a pretty outspoken man when it comes to certain issues. If you know anything about the background of which I come from, of course we come out of the Reformation separating from the Catholic Church.

The writer knows a bit of this history and started to ask me some questions about this. Asking whether or not it was acceptable from our point of view to have him lead the worship service. He was asking questions about whether or not we are like "arch-enemies."

When I hung up the phone, I was almost angry. Angry at the fact that this writer seemed to be trying to get me to say something that would be controversial, I am still waiting to see what he has to say. I mean, obviously our traditions dont agree with each other. There are some things that we just cant agree on. But the purpose of this Jamboree is to praise God. It is not a denominational service. It is to help spread the gospel of Jesus Christ. In this service once a year, the local churches can show our unity in Christ. One of the reasons I think I was a bit angry is because this is coming from a town where there is really, in my opinion, no unity between the churches. In another small town I am a part of a ministerial where the local churches get together and plan events together. It helps to show the community that we are not out to get one another, but we can work together for the broader good. It bothers me that this man would want to, at least seemingly, to stir the pot and try to show that we are not unified. The world is already antagonistic towards the Christian Church in general, in an event like this, it is an opportunity to show that even though we disagree, we are still unified in our Faith in Christ.