What, no doughnuts?

Free doughnut? Yes please…. Well just sit here for a while and I’ll get you one…. 

There was a thing when I was at uni when you put an event on with the Christian Union (CU) that if you wanted people to come then you offered free doughnuts and people would just come. I remember a discussion about whether it was ethical to put up posters that said ‘free doughnuts’ without any sign it was a CU event - if you give someone doughnuts they’ll be happy to sit through a gospel presentation. (I’m not sure my CU did quite that kind of event - we were, I hope more up front about who we were). The whole thought of an underhand way of getting people to come and sit in a room and have beliefs thrown at them is a bit reminiscent of the timeshare ‘come to my party’ invites of the later 20th century - when you got there it turned into a ‘buy a bit of a curtain in this holiday home’ sales pitch and those who were not interested felt duped…. or being accosted by someone on New Street in Birmingham asking if I want to do a personality quiz (yes please I love quizzes) and inviting me in to a building to discover what Christian Science (or some other strange organisation) could do for me. 

I’d almost forgotten about all of this until I went to visit the well dressings in a Derbyshire village. Well dressings are a traditional Derbyshire thing where community groups decorate wells - the origin is in giving thanks for the water. The designs are beautifully made from petals and the way in which they are made and the thought that goes into them is fascinating. Interested in their story and how they are made I was happy to see that there was a video on in the parish church about the well dressings. We’d missed the beginning but it was good to go in half way through. 

The well dressings have a clear link to Christianity, given that over the years each well dressing in each village or town is generally blessed by the local clergy and are giving thanks to God for the water and that the themes of the well dressings are very often faith based - including Bible verses and stories and Biblical themes, and so you’d expect there to be some exploration around the Christian nature of the well dressings. 

But what happened was not quite what I expected and threw me a bit, and took me back to the time of free doughnuts as a mask for some sort of 3 point clever talk around what makes up doughnuts and how that relates to Jesus and all of that (doughnuts have a hole and it’s a bit like the hole in our lives). 

On going through the door, we were directed to specific seats by a man in a raincoat. There were two couples in the church. The film was made during 2021 and was talking about the well-dressings pre covid and the pictures of the number of people in the village were far removed from the few people around on that day. The film finished with a little bit of a description of the faith behind the well dressings and as I thought about getting up to find the light outside again the man in the raincoat got up to the front and threw at us a full on evangelistic message with accompanying powerpoint. 

And you know what? Me, a Baptist minister, felt really uncomfortable. I just wanted to escape. There was nothing in what he said I disagreed with but it was the way he said it. It felt like it all was being forced on me. 

On leaving we were offered (if we wanted to know more) a copy of John’s Gospel and a chat. I swiftly moved beyond the offer. 

I’ve been chewing over why it made me feel so uncomfortable over the last few days. Why did I just want to escape? 

I think it’s because I felt like I was manipulated into listening to something beyond what I asked for - the extra talk at the end wasn’t necessary - it took the whole thing a step beyond…. To leave it with the video and to hand out John’s gospels as we were leaving would have been just about enough. The style was old fashioned - we don’t sell time shares in that way anymore, and free doughnuts don’t come with conditions. 

I don’t believe it was what Jesus did either - yes he preached, he talked, he told stories - he sent out his disciples to do the same, but they weren’t told to hide who they were until they had a captive audience, and they were told if people weren’t interested then to move on. He sat down with people at tables, he gave out invitations to follow, and accepted invitations into others spaces. He showed in word and action the good news he was and is and as he sat down with others and ate doughnuts (or something similar) he met them where they were at. 

So I sit in tension - as I am pleased the message of Jesus has been shared with those who were in that church, I just wonder if it could have been done in a more gracious gentle way, and I wonder if an opportunity to love has been missed. 

Free doughnut anyone?