Church #18: Summerside

1. Who attended? Bradley & Erica.

2. CHURCH HOP RANKINGS:
How was the experience?
1: I was so uncomfortable and/or offended that I did not stay to the end of services.
10: This church was welcoming and thought-provoking. I would recommend that others experience this church.

ERICA: 5.
BRADLEY: 5, this was an average church.

3. Picture(s) of the church

4. Name/location of the church:
Sorry-- I'm used to having pamphlets and things! I forget the exact name of the church-- I'll amend that as soon as I can. So sorry!!

5. Was it recommended to Church Hop?
No-- it's less than a block from our house.

6. Time/duration of services:
11:00am--noon.

7. What type of religion did the church cater to?
Christian.

8. Who did you meet?
The church was very friendly, but I didn't catch any names.

9. If applicable, scans of handouts, tracts, etc
Absolutely none were made available. There wasn't even a visitor card for us to leave.

10. Church Hopper’s personal experience with the church, additional details:

ERICA: This church was... alright. Right away we were welcomed by the majority of the congregation, as is standard with smaller churches. We were also asked if we could sing because the church has no one to lead their hymns. That was a little heartbreaking. It was a prodominately "old church," and the old guys played a good guitar. The people who did sing were pretty bad, but at least they tried. I can't imagine a church without music.

When the sermon started, it was a little uncomfortable. The preacher cried through the entire sermon and spoke about his divorces and how God steered him through. I'm a little torn about hwo to feel about the entire ordeal-- for one thing, you know I love a church with some passion behind it. That man definitely felt his message (and spoke against people who hadn't been saved, naturally). On the other hand, it was incredibly awkward when he got to the part about seeing his wife with another man and how, had it not been for God, he would have been in jail.

BRADLEY: In retrospect, this church really seemed like a normal Church. There wasn't anything new about it, the floors were worn, the walls were old, and the members, well, seasoned. This church seemed to have a routine, one that was very slow paced, and seemed to last very long. Erica and I went on in, and noticed that we brought down the average age by a good 40 years. Regardless of this, we took our seats, and looked around. Like I said earlier, everything was a little worn. We said a few greetings, and we were then asked by a man if we wanted to sing today. Odd. I don't think Erica and I have ever been asked to sing before. It was very strange.

It wasn't until much later, when the church finally started to gain people, but this time, they were a little younger. Small families here, a few single people there. The opening songs went on (great playin') with some light guitar, and some piano-action. It was all very old-timey. Then came the anouncements, which dragged on way to long, and then came the sermon.
.
This was one of the worst sermons I've ever heard. The preacher was crying for the duration of the message, and bringing references to his own life into the sermon. Usually I like when the precher puts in a few of his own stories in there, but these were just pointless references to his many divorces, and wrong choices in life. It really made me feel uncomfortable. Anyway, that really sums up the church, I mean, there wasn't too much to say about it, it was old, and the sermon wasn't that great. Just an O.K. church.

*****
Also! First Baptist Church of Glen Este sent us each a form letter, thanking us for attending last week. I'm not going to bother transcribing it-- the scan came out pretty clearly and nothing particularly meaningful or heartfelt was written.

(If you can't read it, just leave me a message and I'll be happy to type it up-- I'm just not sure that anyone reads these.)