Thou Shalt Not Leave Thy Filth at Church

In the grounds of St Mary the Virgin’s Church, Wylie, Wiltshire, has a sign attached to the external tower door. The church wardens have evidently been faced with the problem of irresponsible dog owners using the beautiful church grounds as a toilet for their pets; too lazy to pick it up and clear it away, off they go to their own homes with muck-free gardens, mission completed, and someone else doing their dirty work.

We have not yet encountered that problem at Salem Chapel; so remote from most places we are, that any dog has likely discharged its bowels long before it troubles our sacred acre. Yet we, and many other churches, weekly face the possibility of far worse things being deposited in our midst. Pride, hard-heartedness, hypocrisy, gossip and back-biting are far more odious commodities than some digested remains of Pedigree Chum, and raise a worse stink to heaven. So come in humility, love, gentleness and grace; nail your obnoxious, Adamic traits at the foot of the Cross and leave them there.

I hate and abhor your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies. Though ye offer me burnt offerings and meat offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou away from me the multitude of thy songs (for I will not hear the melody of thy viols.) Amos 5:21-23, Geneva Bible