La iglesia

Church here is very different. For one, they call the church service a ¨culto,¨ which seems like cult to me, but is exactly the opposite. Let me walk you through two of my church experiences here:

1) Sunday church: Started at 6pm, or so they say, but people come in late. (They also have a service on Saturday night and Sunday morning). The first few minutes are spent in prayer either kneeling at your seat or at the front. A lot of people start crying and repeating out loud certain phrases like ¨santo¨(holy), ¨bendito sea tu nombre¨ (blessed be your name), etc. From there is only escalates. The churches are very humble but all of them have HUGE stereo speakers, drums and a keyboard. (Oddly enough, I still have yet to see a guitarist). All are used to maximum capacity for worship, along with everyones individual voices, who all yell and cry out in rapid succession. When they switch between songs, the voices make up for the lack of sound. It´s as if God is deaf or won´t listen unless your own ears hurt.

The music is very lively. They sing some American songs in Spanish, but they sing them so slowly and loudly that I can´t remember the English words to sing along. When the drums aren´t being used, the keyboardist makes up for it with one of the pre-programed electronic beats, which I find hysterical.

Sermons are different too because they don´t analyze scripture like we do. The pastor just talks about a passage, repeats certain truths and then breaks into song when he feels like it. Like church is a musical extravaganza. The best is what I like to call ¨prayer rapping,¨ when people start praying (more like yelling) and the keyboardist is playing his electronic beat and you can feel the energy in the church. During this time, I usually sit down, ignore what´s going on around me, pray by myself or sing a song in English. Being a generally quiet and introverted at American churches, it´s so overwhelming; I just can´t get comfortable. I pray that as the summer goes on, my heart would stay open to their types of worship instead of retreating.

The service is supposed to only be 2 hours, but last time it went an extra half hour. I´ve found that once you reach the hour and a half mark, you really don´t notice the rest of the time. Plus I´ve gone deaf by that point, so it´s rather peaceful. It also helps to have two little ten year old girls sitting next to you that like to examine your white skin and touch your hair.

2) Last friday a coworker invited me to ¨una vigilia¨ to pray for the cyclone season here. We got there at 8pm, but it didn´t start til 8:30 (typical Latin American timing). They prayed and sang and talked (then rinse and repeat). I wasn´t keeping track of the time, but we left early and I realized it was already 11:30pm! Three hours of worship, and I only understand about half of it at best. wow.

Church is just one more aspect of life where I feel very much alone, foreign, slightly uncomfortable and clueless. But I have to say that I really enjoy going cause it´s amazing to see how people react to God differently. The Dominicanos are lively and passionate. Church isn´t about intellectualizing the Bible and getting personal alone with God. It´s about community praise of the powerful Creator of the universe who really does have the power to change our lives. We use different approaches to understanding a multi-faceted, complex God who just doesn´t fit in our brains all at once. When they pray, they do so with authority, believing that God is listening and powerful enough to make a change. We tend to simply submit requests meekly before God. Maybe this just reflects a difference in needs. Maybe we ought to thank Him more.

Part of me wonders how much of it is authentic and how much is just culturally expected, especially when my little two year-old ¨nephew¨ starts ¨preaching¨ (talking nonsense loudly and becoming animated with his arms). Yet I can´t help but think it´s the same in the US. It´s just that we´re all taught to worship silently to ourselves.

I wonder if we took a group of kids, raised them outside of the church and then told them about Jesus, if they would all worship the same way. I doubt it. And that´s what´s amazing: you can worship God is so many ways. Everyone reacts differently because everyone is different and God works differently in each person. The importand thing is: He´s working in us.

PS-Check out the blogs of the other DR interns. Between the three of us, you´ll get a better understanding of life here. (see right column for links)