Wednesday, June 14, 2006

church, churches, churched, churching

According to my 3-volume, 450,000+ word, Webster’s Third New International Unabridged Dictionary (are you impressed?), “churched” is not just used as an adjective describing someone who is affiliated with a church, it is also a form of the verb, to church, meaning “to bring or conduct to church to receive one of its rites," and “unchurched” means the opposite, that is to deprive someone of the church’s rites. Thus, one could say, “I’ll be churching Grandma today.” We must be careful, however, for the specific word “churching” can also mean “a ceremony by which, after childbirth, women are received in the church with prayers, blessings, and thanksgiving.” So, if I say I'm “churching grandma,” it might give the illusion that it's been a looooooong time since ol’ grandma’s been to church.

Now that I know that all forms of “church” (and would you believe “churchified” is a legitimate form?) can be used as nouns, verbs, or adjectives, in addition to singing, “I am the church, you are the church, we are the church together,” I can also sing, “The church am churched, the church are churched, all the church are churched together…” Of course, that’s kind of like saying that a cheese sandwich is a piece of cheese sandwiched between two slices of sandwich bread.

Now I ask you, if an unchurched happens to church another unchurched, does that make the first unchurched churched? And, how often do churched or unchurched have to church the unchurched before the unchurched are churched and can sing “The church am churched?”

Too hard? Here, I’ll make it simpler: How much churched can an unchurched church ‘fore the unchurched could church churched?

Still too hard? Try this: Chipper Charlie churched a church of unchurched chip-monks. If churlish unchurched chip-monks unchurched Charlie’s chipper chip-monks, where’s the church of Charlie’s chip-monks churlish unchurched churched?

Ow. I’m going to wrap my brain pan in an ace bandage and apply ice now. I think I sprained something.

1 comment:

Preachrboy said...

I think I just bruised my tongue...