It has been a year since I responded to another Church Corner column and as my eye caught this one I could not resist my desire to comment.

In “Day Will Come When Sinners Run To God” (Church Corner, June 20) the opening paragraph is so light and welcoming. How could we do anything less than respond lovingly to someone who loves us?

Then the tone descends into fear. The rest of the article bases all motivation and context on the premise of contempt for our spiritual soundness and worthiness. The good pastor spins off into a narrative of the essence and origin of sin, the consequences to us personally and then ends with the “good news” that the world is ending and that we need to run to God. Does anyone else see the inherent confusion and unfortunate message of this?

Why does our local newspaper acquiesce so willingly to the presentation of concepts and belief systems that attack our very spiritual worthiness and being? Not to mention generating fear and the concept to impressionable minds that we are in such abject need. A rhetorical question at best I know, however, I sincerely believe that not every reader of this paper is necessarily a subscriber to this form of uncertainty and fear. It seems to me that the real need here is to lay aside the fear, shame and willingness to receive contempt from those who wish to save us.

Can we instead use this wonderful community medium to extol the positive aspects of our human nature and our potential to enjoy and contribute to this temporal “heaven”? Or must we remain mired in the archaic belief that we are broken, implying that we do indeed need to “do something” and run….away from who we are, resplendent in the creative genius of being human, and to an ethereal creation of salvation somewhere distant and outside of our innate being.

If indeed the gift is as unconditional as this author suggests…why the urgency and the implication of desperate need for action and imminent disaster?

Yes indeed, I agree. A “bummer.”

Perry Chinn

Enumclaw