August 22

This weekend I went to a Women of Faith conference with some of my co-workers. My boss was generous enough to get us all tickets, and I had a nice time with everyone, and I was very excited to see Steven Curtis Chapman perform on Friday night.

However.

I have a hard time enjoying conferences like these, partially because I'm fairly cynical when it comes to religious "productions." I'm usually on the production side of such things, and so maybe I'm jaded, but I kind of hate it when people put on a show for me and tell me to feel spiritual. Matthew Turner calls this hype a "joygasm" in his [awesome] book "Churched," and that's the word that kept coming to mind when I was sitting there listening to the show.

It also didn't help that they took about 40% of the time plugging their books, future conferences, WorldVision, and their other sponsors. I mean, I realize they have to spend some time doing that, but I feel like they wasted a lot of mine.

Also, the whole "let's tell a sad story and cry and then sing" thing doesn't really appeal to me either. I'm not the girl you see in church putting her hands in the air during the worship songs (or sometimes, even singing at all), and I'd rather hear teaching and theology than stories about "How God changed mah life when I was saaaad." I'm sure this stuff has a place for some people, but for me, not so much. I don't need an emotional experience to believe what I believe.

So there you have it. I have no soul.