The Boy Who Didn't Go to Church

It is a busy Saturday afternoon in the little theater at Whit's End, and Whit and the gang are running their last rehearsal before they perform his new play at church the following night. Connie fusses over the props, the sound effects, and the lights, and then the phone rings with bad news: Jerry Webster, who has the lead role, has come down with a case of nerves and is staying home. Just as everyone decides the rehearsal is off, Jack wanders in. He has not been to church for a couple of weeks - school and other things have kept him busy, he says - but he loves plays, and Whit hands him a script and asks him to read the part marked John.

The play itself is not a true story, Whit explains, but it could happen. It follows a young man named John LaFete, a member of the Brotherhood of Dutiful Youth, or the BODY for short, a group that exists to help people. Every week the members gather with their leader, Mr. Headly, and every week the same thing happens. I.C. Clearly watches for people in need. Doris Lipman does the talking and R.U. Listening does the listening. Hans Armstrong handles the repairs and the heavy work. And John, who volunteers eagerly for every single job, is told again that his gift is taking everybody where they need to go. He is tired of being the one who drives. Walking home, he tells I.C. that he quits, and that he will start a group of his own.

The LaFetes turn out to be full of people who feel exactly the way John does, and they set out downtown bursting with confidence. Then they spend weeks walking the streets and cannot find a single person who needs help. The only face they see day after day belongs to a well-dressed man on a bus bench. John finally asks him whether he knows where anyone in trouble might be found. The man mentions, quietly, that his house burned down with everything he owned inside it, and that the bench is the only place he has left to go - and the LaFetes thank him for his help and walk away without hearing a word of it.

When the man disappears from the bench, Marge at the diner tells them the truth. He lived there, and the authorities moved him along. The one person in the whole neighborhood who needed help was sitting right in front of them, and they missed him twice. Then Marge asks a favor of her own. Her sister is sick with five hungry children, and the food is already cooked; somebody just needs to carry it across town. The LaFetes groan at the thought of more delivery work, but they pick up the food and go. Afterward John notices something strange. For the first time since he left the body, he feels like he has actually helped somebody, and he understands why. He has been trying to do things he is not good at.

He races back to the little building, only to find it empty. I.C. is there collecting the last of her belongings. Without anyone to bring the members to the people who needed them, the body could not do what it was made to do, and it has broken up for good. Hans has joined the circus, Mr. Headly works for a computer company, Miss Lipman answers telephones, R.U. edits radio programs, and I.C. guards a beach. John has come home too late.

When the rehearsal ends, Jack tells Whit the ending is an awful downer and wonders why a church audience should have to sit through it. Because it is about them, Whit answers. He points Jack to 1 Corinthians 12, where Paul writes that Christians are Christ's body and that God has placed each person in it exactly where he wants them. Plenty of people are like John LaFete, Whit says. They would rather be a hand or a head than a foot, they stop feeling like they are getting anything out of church, and so they stop coming - never realizing that the way to get something is to give something, starting with yourself. Jack has plenty to think about as his mother pulls up outside, and when Whit asks whether he will be there tomorrow, Jack says he will.