Welcome Visitor

A few weeks ago we were helping with some cleaning at church and came across these charming vintage “Welcome Visitor” cards. Don’t you just love the picture of the snazzily dressed couple shaking hands with the pastor? This was from an era when people dressed up to go to church, complete with hats and ties for the men… (Mr. Visitor is politely holding his hat, dontcha see?) … and hats, heels, and probably gloves for the ladies. Oh, yes, and a matching clutch purse.

So Mr. and Mrs. Visitor have arrived for the service and are asked to fill out the “Visitor’s Welcome Card”… which seems to ask for a good bit of information from someone who is just trying out churches maybe. Or attending the service while on vacation.

We’re not sure why they are here, but we do want to know if they are a church member. And what church. And what city. And if they attend Sunday School. And where. ‘Cuz probably they go to Sunday School at a different church from where their membership is.And if that’s not enough, they are to check the box if they are interested in joining THIS church.

So let me get this straight. This is my first time here. I probably know very little about the church. I’m just filling out this card because that’s what you do when you visit a church. And you want to know if I am interesting in joining?

That seems a little bizarre.Oh. Never mind. We don’t actually want you to decide about joining today. There were several of these cards in the stack I found that had been edited.

It seems that whoever was in charge of these Welcome Visitor cards back in the day agreed with my assessment, because they carefully blacked blued out that line.

With a crayon.

Reckon they couldn’t find the black crayon? ‘Cuz I can still read the words through the blue crayon. Can’t you?

Just curious. Do you fill out visitor cards when you visit a church? I don’t, if I can get by with it. But then, I’m kinda anti-social that way.