Stories from our Members

• CoR is the most welcoming church you can find anywhere. Everyone who comes in the door can expect to be greeted warmly. At CoR we believe God's love is available to everyone.
• CoR is diverse on almost any plane you can imagine. People who come to Church of the Redeemer have made a deliberate decision that they do not want to just attend a church where everyone looks and acts like they do. We are ethnically diverse, yes, you can see this immediately. But we are also culturally diverse, with many members who are originally from other parts of the world. We are generationally diverse, welcoming babies in to sanctuary with the same enthusiasm that we welcome our oldest members. We are economically diverse: people at our church span the whole range of wealth, education, and backgrounds. The family make-up of our congregation is diverse: we have single, married, divorced, widowed, mixed-race, same-race, mixed-gender, same gender, with no kids, with lots of kids. We strongly believe here at CoR that when we worship with people who are not like ourselves, we learn more about what God wants for us and what God wants for the world.
• The worship at CoR is really great, and reflects the diversity of our membership. Worship styles as CoR vary from service to service and even within a service. The service is warm and relaxed, and yet deeply meaningful. You'll hear "Amen"'s shouted, you'll hear children laughing, you see tears on people's faces and joy in their eyes. The worship at CoR has an authenticity that transcends cultural boundaries and even personal preferences. At CoR worship means truly coming to grips with what it means to say that "God is in this place."
• CoR is paradoxically modern and at the same time old-fashioned. We are just as comfortable dealing with issues of science and religion as we are singing praise to Jesus in an old-time gospel tune. CoR is a place where the membership understands the value of the traditions and lessons of the past. We take the Bible seriously and we look to prayer for guidance and strength.
• People at CoR realize that coming to church does not mean that you check your brain at the door. We embrace the Wesleyan ideal that reason has a role to play in discerning what God has for us in our lives. Our church includes many "intellectual professionals", lawyers, doctors, scientists, etc. We attract students from nearby Case Western Reserve University and John Carroll University. People at CoR embrace a wide range of "personal theologies" and we aim to welcome all seekers who are still working through their beliefs and their ideas of what God has in store.
• CoR is progressive. Our members are often active on the forefront of some of the most important social issues that the church faces today. For people at CoR, taking action in the face of injustice is simply responding with what Jesus would have us do. Many members are especially concerned about issues regarding racial justice, gender equality, economic justice for the hungry, poor, and/or homeless, and issues of war and peace.
• CoR is a "missions-oriented church". We have a deep and abiding love affair with the old Methodist notion that the Church is the body of God acting in the world. We feel that God calls us to serve those outside our walls. We serve locally, nationally, and globally. We regularly help to feed the hungry serving and cooking meals. We send a mission team out annually for a week of volunteer service somewhere outside our state. Almost ever church group -- men's women's and youth -- devotes substantial time and effort in in missions and service, helping those in need. Through our annual apportionments to the larger denomination we directly support the service and charitable efforts of the larger church. We also set aside money to help individuals in need and for those suffering through disasters. For many of our members, there is no better way to participate in God's work than in service to others.
• CoR is a "medium sized" neighborhood church....most everyone knows most everyone else. It's a family, a supporting community. And yet at the same time our church and the members in it always seems to be playing major roles in the larger district of the United Methodist Church. We have more than our fair share of leaders and trend-setter, pillars and prophets.
• At Church of the Redeemer, living a Christian life as a disciple of Jesus means being there for each other and for the world in times of trouble. At CoR a central part of every worship service, indeed of every activity, is a time for sharing joys and concerns to be lifted up in prayer. We know that through prayer, we are there for each other to offer support, to ask for healing, to lend a hand in need.