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Alpha - More Than Just the Beginning
By
Bob Orrick
11 September 2003
Perhaps you have seen the advertisements: billboards, newspapers, door hangers, lawn signs, banners, and television spots. If you have, you might have been intrigued as to their purpose. If you have not seen the advertisements, then there is every possibility that you will, and soon.
On Monday, 15 September, The Alpha Course - an opportunity to explore the meaning of life, will kick off its countrywide "Invitation to the Nation" campaign. From West to East, from South to North, churches will begin the fifteen-week, fifteen-video and session, course. The Alpha course begins with a mid-week dinner followed by a video, the first of the fifteen, and an invitation to attendees to sign up for the course that usually commences the following Monday.
Churches of all backgrounds and traditions - more than two thousand churches currently offer Alpha in Canada - have joined to spread the word and renew the vision. As quoted in Alpha News, Canada edition, "The renewed vision to reach our nation for Christ overwhelms past histories and dissolves current challenges and differences."
In some Canadian communities, churches have joined together to host Alpha dinners. In Swift Current, Saskatchewan, eight churches got together and rented the local hockey rink and then invited the entire town to supper. From all reports, it was a smashing success!
"In initiatives of this kind in the UK and New Zealand have resulted in greatly increased numbers of people attending Alpha courses. In the UK, brand recognition of the Alpha course is growing and fourteen per cent of the population now recognize the programme as a Christian course." [Ibid]
Throughout Canada, more than three hundred fifty thousand have attended the Alpha course; worldwide, six million have taken the course. Both Canadians and others have come to faith and many more are having their faith renewed and revitalised.
Reverend Sandy Miller, Rector of Holy Trinity Brompton, London, England, where Alpha began a decade or so ago, said, "Our goal is to make sure, as far as possible, that everyone has an opportunity to explore the meaning of life and to find Jesus Christ for themselves."
In today's troubled world, where Christians and Jews and Muslims are battling over sacred ground and where tolerance of others seems to be out of date, Alpha and its "Practical introduction to the Christian Faith" seems appropriate.
A quote from The Alpha Course manual at page one, "Christianity is public truth. If it is true for anyone, it is true for everyone. If it is not true for anyone, it is not true for everyone."
Whether or not one believes in Jesus Christ and, therefore, Christianity, the world is a better place for His having been born, having died for our sins, and having risen from the dead. Much of the good in the world of yesterday and today, and quite probably, tomorrow, was, is and will be based on the teaching of Jesus. It has been said umpteen times that a dying man [or woman] often cries out for God and seeks in his death cries, the comfort of Jesus.
The forgoing comment on Alpha is intended to bring to the attention of Christians who might have become a bit bewildered by and of their faith or to non-believers that there is a programme that is designed to provide a simple yet comforting way for them to explore Christianity. From having attended several Alpha courses, I have learned that both atheists and agnostics have been drawn to Alpha; some have stayed and become staunch soldiers for Christ. Some of those who have become Christ's soldiers had spent years in prison for heinous crimes. Others, drawn to the Alpha dinners, came, ate, viewed but did not return. That is their choice; nobody at Alpha twists arms. Whether or not one returns is a matter of choice and personal conscience. All of us, at one time or another, will face our Maker. For Christians, knowing a bit about Jesus will make the eventual meeting all the more enjoyable.
Bob Orrick is a private tutor of English grammar, literature, poetry and Canadian history to off-shore youngsters. His pupils hail from such places as Taiwan, China, Japan, Hong Kong, Korea and Venezuela. He was previously in international marketing, was a ministerial assistant to a provincial cabinet minister, spent a few years as a reporter then editor of a community newspaper and enjoyed a career in the Royal Canadian Navy.
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