I took this picture of this church last week while I was in Heidelberg, Germany. It sits in the city square and is around 300 years old.

While it still holds services on Sunday's, it is mostly used for tourists. Back in its day, this church represented hope, power, and protection for the citizens of this city. Now it's a beautiful building and it's mission and message is much more subdued.

I've been a part of many conversations that bemoan the "secularization" of societies. Many American church historians view Europe as a case study in the secularization of the culture and the death of the Church, seeing them mostly as relics. This inspires contemporary church planters in America to strive and make churches something relevant and influential for modern people.

So what makes something a relic?  As I've considered this, I think the answer has to do with whether a community has the ability to go beyond what is on the surface.

This sounds simple enough, but in reality, it takes a higher consciousness to not be distracted by the thing, and be able to apprehend the thing behind the thing.  This distinction is a very spiritual awareness.

Religion thrive on externals. Tall buildings, elaborate art, awe inspiring productions, differentiating robes or clothing, and rituals all mark externals with which people become anesthetized. We see this religion in educational and political institutions as well. 

These are all designed to take a person deeper and help them access that part of themselves where they are open to the transcendent. But it is all too easy to avoid the difficult spiritual work of going deeper, and settle for the external show.

So whether we are talking about a 300 year old building or a group that meets at the local junior high school. Both can be relics, if the participating community is unable to connect to anything beyond its scaffolding.

Connecting to the thing behind the thing does not require any externals, but they can help. It only requires an honest humility. Once we possess it, then any external thing can easily become the vehicle that inspires us to go deeper and to look at the internal work that we need to take seriously.

Is your faith a relic? How much time do you spend reinforcing the externals? How much of your life is given to make a big show for others? Or how important to you are such things?

A relic then becomes a disposition of the heart. Every possible subject can be a tool, like an old church, to help us find and grow our best life and self. If we lack the bandwidth or desire to go to that spiritual place, then we should not be surprised if many things in our life feel dead or meaningless, because we have made all things into relics, and we've become bored.