For where two or three do not gather in my name, I am not there with them

 

Another day, another dodgy property investment expert mouthing off all over social media...

"I wanna buy churches like this that are shutting down across England.  So if you know a church that's for sale and potentially closing down, let me know. I wanna buy a church.  I don't care if it's got planning permission to return to flats redeveloped. I don't care.  I wanna buy it. I don't care how profitable the conversion will be.  If it was built as a church, I believe it needs to stay as a church.  I want to save churches like this one from being shut down and sold off to developers all across the UK.  I love making profit in property, but when someone's being built as a church to honour Jesus Christ, that's a no no. There's revival coming in England and we need to keep our churches open. Ready for what’s to come. Is this a good idea you would support?"

So speaketh Mr Samuel Leeds who seems to make a living selling property investment advice like many other monotonous mouthpieces in what remains of the British economy.  You gotta have a gimmick though whether it's buying churches or living in Monaco.  I spoke to my Christian neighbour Dorothy Cotton who said that whilst she wished to bless his heart and chip in, suspiciously lacking from the grim faced Mr Leeds's social media entreaties is any mention of stuff like prayer.  Or any mention of Biblical inspiration.  Perhaps we can provide some?

One is reminded of John 18:36 "My kingdom is not of this world".  Or the tale of the Widow's mitre in Luke 21 "He sat down opposite the treasury and observed how the crowd put money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow also came and put in two small coins worth a few cents. Calling his disciples to himself, he said to them, 'Amen, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the other contributors to the treasury. For they have all contributed from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has contributed all she had, her whole livelihood.". Still, at least the rich people did put in money, not ask for the Temple's postcode.

St Predator of Bandwagon

Coming onto more practical matters, if you were to purchase a disused church (and it's conspicuous that Mr Leeds is not offering to buy one, just asking for intel on where one might be) the first most obvious problem that would spring to my mind would be that there is a bit of a staffing problem.  When I was a child the Sacred Heart and St Thomas at Whyteleafe had three priests living together in a house in a not-unlike-Father-Ted situation.  There were about 5 masses.  One at 6:30 on a Saturday.  Then 8am, 10am, noon?... I forget the others.  We always went to the 8am because my father had a low boredom threshold and this was the shortest.  With none of your folk singers and organists wanting to perform to an audience that was still in bed Father Harrington could skip through the whole thing in half an hour - often 25 minutes.  According to my father when he was in the RAF some priests could get it down to 20 minutes.  Priests were appreciated for their brevity.  Get it out the way quickly so you can enjoy the rest of your Sunday... sort of like a visit to the lavatory.  St Thomas's is now flats and there is only one priest.  According to Canon Law one priest can say only 3 masses in one 24 period and only two maximum on one day.  This has greatly reduced the number of masses... With increasingly frail priests covering ever wider areas.  I'm sure other denominations have similar staffing problems...  But a church is a living thing made of people... Much like a Comedy Club.  Without acts and an audience any venue is little more than an empty room.  

Indeed, I was reminded of the time PJ started a failed Comedy Club in the backroom of a pub in Stockwell which he shared with a religious sect who had it the other day of the week and seemed to regard him as a venue thief.  The religious regalia such as Crucifixes had to be hidden every time the dirty comedy was on and the comedy posters taken down whenever Christ was there because unlike Paul Kerensa no one had adapted their act for our saviour by removing the swearwords.... A bitter battle for control ensured which PJ lost ... For even though there are less churches and services than there used to be religion still pulls more punters on a Sunday than most of the entertainment industries combined.  At the end of the line if he really wanted to help churches why not fund ones that still have congregations - there is a collection plate, mate? As the good Lord said: "For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them ... and where they are not ... there is a Property Investor"