Church/ Iglesia

Last week I went to church with another girl from our group, Bianca.  She goes every week and has invited me several times, but I'm terrible at waking up on Sunday mornings.  Plus, we're usually gone on the weekends, or I'm catching up on schoolwork.  She was attending the evening service, so I finally quit making excuses and went.  We rode the bus for about an hour to a suburb of Buenos Aires to attend the Christian Bible Church.

I personally choose to practice spirituality more-so than religion, but it never hurts to congregate with positive, loving people.  Besides, I thought it would be interesting to see a church service in a different country.

It broke all sorts of stereotypes.  Everyone knows South America is a predominantly Catholic culture; the same goes for Argentina.  The reason Bianca travels an hour to go to church is because it's more evangelical.  It was shocking to be in a church almost exactly like the one I grew up in when the only picture I had in my head of Argentine religion was Catholic cathedrals.  Service opened with worship songs accompanied by a few singers and a band.  Afterward, we listened to the choir and heard the service.   I felt like I was in the twilight zone because it was the exact Spanish version of First Assembly of God in Jefferson City.

Like I said before, I have a very open idea of religion and don't consider myself Christian even though I have a very close relationship with God, or whatever you want to call our creator (Mother Nature, Allah, Buddah, etc.)  Anyways, I don't attend church regularly, but the sermon was exactly what I needed.  I'm a huge believer in faith and metaphysics, which is what the pastor was talking about.  Verbalizing your faith makes it a reality.  Sounds a lot like "Think.  Feel. Receive" right? Anyways,  I tried my best to sing along with the songs.  Even just singing was a big morale booster.  Music is one of the biggest parts of my life, and the lack of it in BA makes me sad.  There's music everywhere I guess, but not my piano, guitar, concerts, or late night drives SCREAMING at the top of my lungs.

I felt truly empowered after listening to the sermon, and afterwards Bianca introduced me to friends she's made over the last couple months.  I'm really happy I went.