The Church: An Unfortunate Community Masquerade.. at least at times

Is a church merely a building with a steeple, a place for christians to congregate once a week for their service rituals? No, the church is a community that encompasses all those in the body of christ despite nit-picky disagreements that cause us to separate into denominations. This community is to try to live like Christ, to live in the kingdom of heaven on earth. This means that the church needs to be concerned with social justice. Now, it is true that in todays society the government takes care of a lot of people who would have previously been taken care of by the church (such as government pension to seniors and the disables who can no longer work). However, there are still many social issues in which the church should be involved, we would live quite differently if we really considered 'What Would Jesus Do?' before every action. For example: would Jesus really toss a tin can on the ground? or would he recycle it so that it could be reused instead of harming the earth his Father created? The church often loses sight of this. We become more concerned of keeping those who may not necessarily live a 'christian lifestyle' outside of our neighborhoods than with loving them. We need to remember that Jesus hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors who stole. The original church, that is those who first started following Christ, were open about their downfalls, their lifestyle changed when they started following Christ and everybody knew it because they knew who they had been and who they were after following Christ.
Today I believe that we see this change and often believe that we must show no remnants of our old lives. This often leads to a false from being put on by Christians that make us appear like we have our entire life together and do not struggle with sin. The early church used to have a time at their meetings for public confessions of sins in front of the entire congregation. Now i recognize that with our current society and legal issues that go along with some sins not all sins can be told to the entire church meeting, but i believe that it is extremely important to talk about our struggles and shortcomings with each other within the church body. When we fail to share our struggles and get encouragement from one another we become hypocritical preaching against that which we hide and let grow in the dark corners of our lives (which leads to situations like the one that involves Ted Haggard). I believe that the Church exists largely to fulfill the function of James 5:6:
" Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. "
As a Church we exist to help and support each other and the world around us, not judge.