Ok, so the little I know about the purpose driven Rick Warren suggests that his church is probably not going to be my cup of tea, but even I wasn’t prepared for this:
Dig around the website a bit and you can find some real gems; such as the opportunity to learn to worship through hula dancing (lessons provided) and a special section of the website in case you’re a first time visitor and are unsure what to wear. The advice is "dress casually and you’ll fit right in. After all, we have a pastor who wears Hawaiian shirts… and no socks!".
Shudder.
I mean, obviously, 'with socks' would be worse, but even so...
But hey, maybe best not to completely judge a church purely on fashion sense (really Steve I know you want to, but it’s not 'good'...), so I had a look at the "what we believe" section. Unsurprisingly they consider the bible inerrant, but then I’m not too troubled because apparently the good news that this church is selling, is only applicable to the male half of the population anyway. Unsurprisingly perhaps this is a message delievered by men in bad shirts.
The range of worship styles poses a lot of questions about how ghettoised church is and/or should be. Wise folk are debating this on a couple of blogs around the place such as here and here
Obviously, being the shallow blogger that I am, I’m more intrigued by the superficial issues, such as the naff logos and the terrible fashion crimes. After all, if these guys were serious about being culturally relevant, then maybe they should worry a little less about the presentation and maybe look at things like getting with the programme and working out that gender exclusive language and leadership are a little more important than whether you can bring coffee into the service (apparently "Yes! You can...").
Until then, I reserve the right to refuse to take Saddleback too seriously and will return to happily judging them on their naff presentation and dubious fashion sense.
I mean, do they really think Hawaiian shirts are a selling point???
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