theIPU

Why do you have to church if your god is omnipresent?

wildernesse

Most church is about community--a gathering of like-minded individuals for communal times of fellowship, learning, and worship. Most people enjoy spending time with people who are like them.

--tibac

beoba

collection plates arent omnipresent.

spurly

At most meetings of the church, collections are not taken.

Since the church is simply the people who belong to Christ, when they get together for dinner, to play cards, to visit, to pray, or to do whatever, it is the church. Most of the time no collection is taken.

One of our problems is that we see church as what takes place in a building, that is part of it - but in no way is that all of it.

Kevin

Albert Cipriani

Dear IPU,
You ask, For the same reason virtual relationships are not as fulfilling as real ones. Of course, my answer is for Catholics who celebrate the Mass on Sunday. It is not applicable as an explanation for Christian Sunday Services, which are non-liturgical and non –sacramental, and as Wildernesse admits, a social affair.

In the sacrament of the Mass, as in all sacraments, the Real Presence of God, as opposed to His abiding metaphysical presence (what you call omnipresence) or spiritual presence (“where two or more are gathered in My name”) is made manifest. You might say that the presence of God, then, can be expressed in three orders of magnitude – metaphysically, spiritually (or virtually), and really (or sacramentally).

Likewise, your relationship with your significant other may be expressed (like in Ray Charles’ “Georgia”) by her ever being on your mind, by a phone conversation, or by intercourse. It should not surprise us that the spiritual world is as hierarchical as the physical world. – Sincerely, Albert the Traditional Catholic

Godot

Albert,
you would probably be the best person here to answer this (first)question for me as my memory is failing me. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but doesn't the Catholic Mass need to be performed on consecrated grounds? And, if so, is this requirement the exclusive domain of Catholicism or is it practiced by other denominations as well?

theIPU

So your god's kind of like spread out unequally through the universe? E.G. your god's more in heaven than hell?

Badfish

God is omni present, he is everywhere, and all at the same time!

People like to congregate to glorify and worship the being responsible for their eternal life.

Albert Cipriani

No. It's a nicety and a formality... in normal times, perhaps a requirement to have the bishop bless the church before the first Mass is celebrated therein. But it is not the same kind of requirement as, for example, that the bread be unleavened or that real wine be used or that the priest have the proper intention or follow the rubrics precisely and consecrate both species not just one.

During WWII, during the consecration of the Mass, a bomb dropped into a Church. The priest continued with the consecration of both species and did not leave the altar until done. To have interrupted the sacrament, even for his own personal safety, would have been a sin. -- Albert the Traditional Catholic

theIPU

Yes, I understand that concept. What I am asking is if your god is equally everywhere. Is he 99% in the church and only 1% in other places? Is that a reason to go to church?

worship the being who will send some to eternal life even if it's in a burning lake of fire...