In the House of God

17 May

Is it possible to leave your belonging, a bag or a purse more likely, in a church’s pew and find it still there later the moment you return?

Today, trust is a rare currency. People get to be suspicious about everything easily. People HAVE TO be suspicious about everything. But how can you blame them? Honesty and honor have been disappearing long before. You have to keep an eye on everything you’ve got to make sure that nothing bad happens to it. When the time gets hard, people have nothing more crucial to think about but themselves.

Theft happens everywhere. People lose their belongings from public places like rail and bus stations to private places like houses and offices. There is no place safe enough to leave your belongings unattended. Crime is not born out of intention anymore, but out of opportunity. Which then brings the main question to the spotlight. Are religious places immune to this morally degrading phenomenon?

My Moslem friend once lost his Crocs shoes when he carried out evening prayer in a musholla, a small mosque equal to a chapel in its Christian counterpart, in a mall. Before that case, there were many cases of sandals and shoes thefts in both mosques and mushollas that there is a joke that the jemaah are merely practicing of the ulama’s preacher to “take the good ones and leave the bad ones.” Of course, the preacher actually talks about behavior instead of sandals and shoes.

I have never done any proper research about it before so I will just speak from my experiences. I have been attending masses regularly in several different churches for almost ten years in three cities. The fact is, most parishioners do not believe that a place full of people worshipping God is friendly enough for their unattended purses and bags. In my hometown, I dare to say that ALL parishioners within my view range bring their purses and bags with them when they receive communion. In the town where I went to college, the thing was a bit trickier since I used to go to English mass in a hospital chapel where the parishioners were students from nearby dormitory who, of course, never bother to bring purses or bags with them. So there was really nothing to say about it.

Here, in the capital city of Indonesia, things are more challenging. As like any capital city all over the world, Jakarta is a tough place. People are more individual, consumptive, and competitive in order to survive and achieve success. I lost my cell phone once to a pickpocket in a bus shelter. Many of my friends also have experienced the same. Therefore, practically you may hope less about honesty and safety here. Surprisingly, that is not what I found in my church.

The first time I went to this church, I did it like I always did. I carried my bag along with me when I received communion. This went on for some time until I read a comment from a Singaporean named Angela in Mr. Nury’s blog. She put forward the irony that people who come to the house of God supposedly to seek comfort and peace, feel insecure about other people’s intention around them. Her comment snapped me to the point that I felt shame every time I had the thought to take a precaution of theft by carrying my bag with me when I received communion. This also marked the day I started to observe people’s behavior regarding their bags in church.

To this day, I have been more than happy to see that almost all parishioners are willing to leave their bags, especially women of course, on pews while they come forward to receive communion. It is either that or they just don’t bring anything valuable inside their bags (which I cannot believe because since when women who wear high heels and bring fancy bags leave at least their women wallets and latest tech gadgets?). True that there are still some others who think otherwise and carry their bags with them. However, half of them do it because they intend to walk straight to the door right after they receive communion. Not exactly the right thing to do but that’s another matter. And while we can pray for them to realize that that’s not exactly what’s the Church expected from parishioners, we can pray for the other half too that they can learn from their brothers and sisters in God and start to believe that when you want to change the world, you need to do it from yourself.