On Tuesday I wrote a post about the Washington Post article about the abuse that occurred at the Vienna Presbyterian Church. The story was in many ways about results of this scandal in the lives of the young woman who were victims and how the Church let them down. It was also also about how Vienna Presbyterian is seeking to build a community of reconciliation around this failure of Christian Community. I continue to pray that those involved in this situation will all find healing, personally and institutionally. I also continue to admonish everyone to apply the lessons that Vienna has learned in our own lives. It is easy to become a voyeur in a situation like this and say “Thank God it wasn’t me or my church on the front page of the Post.” 
In a real and spiritual way, we were on the front page right alongside our brothers and sisters in Vienna. The church is bound together by Christ. When I chose my graphic for my post on Monday I chose the broken heart. I had originally chosen a much more shocking and perhaps telling image for my post. I wanted to express the true brokenness of our life in the church and the sadness I feel for the Church Universal. In the end I found myself wanting to put forth a much more hopeful image of what God is doing in the broken Church. Let me know, do you think this would have been better?
Yikes. I am all for the hopeful heart image…though frankly the sharp point of the steeple is a valid image to capture the pain of the stab in the heart from such betrayals .
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