Happy Reformation Day!

Today marks the 494th anniversary of the posting of the 95 Theses on the door of the church in Wittenberg.  This also marks the 493rd anniversary of the first time a kid was told that they couldn't go trick or treating because they had to go to Reformation Day services at church tonight.  Okay, probably not, but I'm still a little bitter that this happened to me.

While everyone else at school could trick or treat from the moment the bus dropped them off until they couldn't walk anymore, I had an hour and a half (3:30 until 5:00), then had to bathe, eat, dress, and be in a pew at 7pm.  I'm pretty sure I could hear my non-Lutheran friends ringing the doorbell of the house next to the church while slogging through verse 9 of A Mighty Fortress.  When I hit high school, we stopped hosting Reformation Day services, along with a number of midweek services, because they just got harder and harder for people to attend.  It was about the time that the Saturday evening church service was added, mainly because more and more members were working Sunday.  Truthfully, I liked Saturday afternoons because I didn't have to wake up early on Sunday anymore, but as work schedules varied more and more from the traditional 9-5, Monday through Friday, workweek, the church had to adapt.  So long Wednesday Advent services - we're all working late hours in December.  Somewhere, some kid gets to trick or treat because the congregation doesn't have enough willing and able members to go to church at 7pm on a Monday.  They're probably working instead.