I’ve been a member of the Church of Sweden all my life, and the last years I’ve been paying membership fees through my federal tax payments (one percent of my income). Since I became old enough to manage my own tax, I have made the concious decision to remain a member because I have felt that at least something good must be there somewhere, and that the Church hasn’t gone too far off from the path.

Until now. I can no longer stand for what the Church of Sweden is doing (Swedish) and I will withdraw my membership, hoping to sponsor a more Jesus-focused organization with my money. Prästerik has also been writing about the Church recently, a very good read (if you know Swedish )

Now, as a believing Christian I usually don’t care too much about different denominations, I find ecumenicalism to be very important all over the world. That, however, does not mean we should embrace and accept everything just because “other people do it”. When somebody is doing wrong you just cannot accept just for the sake of acceptance. The Church seems to care more (Swedish, again) about being seen than to reflect upon what a church really does in the first place. Because of these, and other reasons I found during the recent years, I can now say I disagree with what the Church is doing and will no longer stand for them. I mean…look at what they write about their faith on the website. I know that only 10% of my blog readers come from Sweden, but try to find the word “Jesus” on that page. At the time of writing, it can be found once, in a user comment. This is a Christian church, people!

Some people, especially in the Church, seem to think that the gospel should become “more polished” so that people will have easier accepting it and bringing more people to God, but I believe nobody will find Jesus the least bit interesting if we remove what he really is! And today there is really no limit to polished, colgate-smiling things to do and/or buy to make you Feel Better™, and then why would anybody choose the Church to find such things? Will anybody who “tries” will find it is only makeup and no substance?

Note that, when I write “Church” capitalized, I specifically mean the Church of Sweden, Svenska Kyrkan, and no other denomination.

Let’s see what you have to say. I don’t know if I’ve opened a can of worms here, but do comment and write what you think!