Vachon Imagined

Churches are businesses.

They have protocols and policies, not much different from your very own home. You have processes. You have ways of doing things. You have, in your own way, a religion.

Everyone is a religious person in this sense.

We all have our way of doing things. Our way of speaking. Our way of understanding. And eventually, this becomes mine.

My life.
My God.
My religion.

You are allowed to hold it. You are allowed to investigate it. You are allowed to question it. But when you begin to hold it as though you possess it, this is where the church becomes less about people and more about image.

Certain people are in.

Others are out.

It is the way of business.

And the leader of the institution is the one who has been entrusted with, or impressed by, the vision to make it happen.

Men have made many of these choices. In the United States, the overwhelming majority of church leaders are still men. They have been marked as special, and this specialness itself can become a setup for praising men over God.

From there, division follows.

Women are permitted certain roles. Men are given others. Men are meant to be the kings of the jungle. Sexuality is judged as good, better, acceptable, or unacceptable—not necessarily according to truth, but according to the rules of the institution.

And when we look to institutions for our truth, we become enthralled by something that is not God itself.

Because institutions require humans to define, interpret, categorize, and assign meaning to something that may simply require trust.

And when we confuse the institution with God, we become victims of doctrine and of people.

All over the world, people get hurt.

Institutions are part of our world. They will not simply be toppled, because if one falls, another will be built.

Humans love meaning.

Someone else will come along and create a following. A building. A system. A hierarchy. And then declare someone special.

Maybe this is the way it will always be.

But never mistake the institution—or any institution—for the power of God.

When we do, we are misled.

And suddenly, the sheep are being led to the slaughter.

The worst part is that we do not even know it.