Monday, May 4, was a holiday in Great Britain, an ideal day for the Earlsdon Methodist Church to sponsor a Soul Clinic for the community. Also called a Spirit-Mind-Body Fair, the soul clinic is designed to appeal to the growing number of people who consider themselves spiritual, but not religious.
The church building is transformed for the day, with booths set up throughout the room for the various spiritual activities to be offered. Some examples, with quotes from the brochure:
* healing prayer is offered for any who ask
* dream interpretation
* halo prayer. “Through the Holy Spirit, [Methodist minister Colin Telfer] is led to areas of prayer revealed in the colors that form a halo around a person.”
* Prayer – prophetic pictures. “These are pictures seen in the mind’s eye, as a pictorial message from God to the recipient. They can be used to direct prayer and ministry, or to speak out God’s encouragement.
*Well-being through touch. “Holistic massage is about sensitive communication through the medium of touch. . . Christ centered attitude, care and love enhances this treatment and body felt emotions are released, often shared and if possible brought into the presence of Christ, allowing His touch and love to heal.”
American churches are accustomed to hosting blood drives and rummage sales, but as far as I know, no church has held a soul clinic. So, what is going on here? Well, it is strange and new for British churches too, and the sponsoring churches have to search far and wide to find trusted Christian practitioners of these unusual activities.
The soul clinic appeals to people who resist the cerebral approach to life. In contrast, they desire to experience life through emotions, through bodily awareness, and to integrate these ways of knowing with their intellect. The post-modern approach holds Christianity at arm’s length in part because it seems to many people today that it focuses only on ideas and doctrines. The soul clinic invites people off the street to connect with God in ways more appealing to many post-moderns because these approaches are less rational and more wholistic.
Posted in Missional Church
