I have long been uncomfortable with megachurches, both because there can never be any intimacy between pastor and flock, and because the resources spent on building these enormous buildings never seems to think of a dual purpose: church on Sunday; Christian school M-F. But when organizations are big, they can attempt great things.
Samaritan's Purse airlifted a mobile hospital to Italy for COVID-19 relief, and set up a field hospital in new York City to the
predictable disgust of
the LGBTQIIXABCDEFG community. The church that I attend put those economies of scale to work.
4/14/20 KTVB:
EAGLE, Idaho — Members of a local congregation are pitching in to
help make masks for healthcare workers and others who need them.
Jerri Greenman, a quilter at Eagle Christian Church said that she and
about two dozen other church members have created over 1,000 masks for
the Treasure Valley community and beyond.
“At this point, we’ve distributed masks to The Terrace, Saint Al’s,
Saint Al’s healthcare, and Saint Al’s hospice. Immediate family of
patients are now able to wear them,” she said. “We’ve sent some to
Washington state, California, and New York.”
When I was in Mexico City helping with communications after the 1985 earthquake, I ran into a couple of interesting Christian groups.
ReplyDeleteThe Southern Baptist Convention had semitrailer disaster relief setups. Each truck had a good sized kitchen, all sorts of supplies, and a very impressive ham radio station, good for long distance and local communications. It was very impressive. The one I visited had set up in a poor slum (where my cab driver was afraid to go), rather than downtown where a lot of more high profile outfits were.
I also met some pilots from Mission Pilots, an interdenominational group of pilots who support Christian missions in poor rural areas. I'm not quite sure why they were in Mexico City - perhaps to fly supplies out to rural areas that had been hit.