i went for bartley church fellowship today, just for the heck of it.

and you know what, i really liked it.

i felt a bit weird at first because i was sort of out of place - as i always seem to be at churches - but then i saw ivan teo, someone i greatly admire, and still do, leading worship.

it also helped that my fellow classmates [chalene! gayle!] were all with me - they were the ones who wanted me to come.

we had a short praise session followed by testimonies and then the youth pastor Dave gave a sermon. then we broke away into CGs and went for discussions. naturally i was with all the SC girls, which felt good and on the whole, i just felt so comfortable there.

there was slight discomfort because i knew that some of the ACS people possibly knew who i was, but that didn't really affect me much. i was so impressed by their vast bible knowledge even though they were the same age as me - it was amazing that ian, some guy, could answer my questions so fully with biblical knowledge.

i mean, i still wasn't very satisfied, but woweeeee.

ivan came to talk to me and passed me a package from nat [baptism gift] - i was kinda sad that she stopped going. i said i would talk to her online to tell her how i found her church [she first brought me to bartley last year but i never went back since] but i ended up coming back cos of cha, well, only now.

charm of course, fell asleep during the sermon and didn't understand a thing but i really don't think she should feel so troubled by it - i should feel more troubled, i'm the one getting baptized next week and that was only her first time at a church. as a catholic though, i felt like some sort of specimen, they seemed to have this certain idea about us that we are anti-christian, worship mary like God and are basically, well, wrong.

that is so not true.

i'm aware that i sound rather pathetic, but that's all i can really say. it's not true. and i tried explaining a bit about how our creed says, 'we believe in one God' and that when we do hail marys we are not elevating mary to God-like status, but i'm just not very good at those things. i could tell it was a sensitive topic.

anyhow after the whole youth meeting ended charm and yilin left [yilin's not coming to my baptism. she'll be in bali:( so she passed my invite to chia ying] for home and went on the bus without waiting for me and said they would wait at toa payoh MRT!

i didn't know if i should have gone home with them or joined chalene and co for dinner and in the end i decided not to be so anti-social so i told charm not to wait. turns out four other churchies i didnt know came along too, and it was nice. the only time so far i've been out for so called 'fellowship' with church mates was at jace's church last year [which, again, i only went for once] - i've never gone with my own church youth. not because i don't like them or anything, but because i suppose i haven't gotten to that level of comfort yet.

maybe when i'm around people i know better i tend to speak more because it gives me the confidence to talk to others that i don't really know then. i don't know. i know that some people get the impression that i'm cold, detached and maybe stuck-up. but i'm not, i'm just shy.

yeah maybe a lot of people who don't know me don't really like me. sad.

after we had dinner at j8 food court we left some of the guys and i went off with my classmates and one of the churchies, joanne from rgs. we took a neoprint 0_0 which was, well, nice. haven't really taken a big groupy one in ages. and.. anyway, yeah it was just NICE, hanging out with sarah, cha, gayle, chia ying and joanne whom i barely knew but was very nice.

then we decided to buy tickets for the 9.40 Elf showing and hung around waiting for the rest of the bartley youth leaders so sarah and joanne could join them for their screening of 9.30 matrix and we could go off.

ELF IS A REALLY REALLY REALLY GOOD GOOD GOOOOOOOD MOVIEEEEEE. its so christmassy it puts me in the mood, when the movie ended i still had a smile on my face. and it's so very very funny. i really loved it, such a heart-warming show - how buddy would say 'i love you' without any fear or any self-consciousness. i loved that.

i keep saying that everything is nice.

i haven't really felt that much warmth, friendliness and pure concern for such a long time.

i'm considering going for youth service at bartley again but it would be really hectic, going for both ED on fridays [which i intend to continue with next year] and then bartley on saturdays. maybe some people think i'm weird, a catholic going to a christian church, and they'll try to make me convert. but i don't believe in denominations at all. i like the catholic church because of its mass and certain values it has - i feel the mass really captures everything so perfectly and that's why i want to be baptised catholic. but that doesn't mean i won't go to methodist or presbytarian churches - as i said, denominations mean nothing to me. is that wrong?

oh dear, i don't know.

+ posted by M @ 1:40 AM