As boaters pull up to a dock on Lake Blackshear, the Rev. Dorsia Atkinson Jr. checks a tool bag he’ll use as part of his sermon and the minnow buckets that will serve as collection plates.
“You come in your bathing suit, come in your T-shirt, come in your shorts, come in your flip-flops, and you’re not worried about looking like someone should look to be at church,” says Atkinson.
He’s describing the Boat Church ministry of Warwick United Methodist Church. For the past six years, he has led outdoor Boat Church services on Sunday mornings on a vacant lot beside the lake. Worshippers sit in lawn chairs by the water or listen from their boats.