In my earlier, Protestant life, people used to talk about finding a church home. Looking for great fellowship? Try the Baptists; they had Wednesday night supper. Looking for a serious inductive Bible study? Find a solid Presbyterian Church that held tight to its reformed roots. Yearning for transcendent worship? You’d likely be happiest in a high Anglican congregation, one that held onto the “smells and bells” of the Pre-Vatican II liturgical rite of the Catholic Church without the uncomfortable weight of so much troublesome doctrine. Looking for my tribe within the church—that did not feel like a strange pursuit to me by the time I got to college. 

My folks stopped going to the Southern Baptist  church I was raised in around the time I got my driver’s license (I mean, they just stopped going, for reasons that remain unclear to me even today) and I, unwilling to give up the Sunday morning custom I’d loved throughout my childhood, took it upon myself to drive to various churches each Sunday morning in search of a new church home. There was more there, to be sure, than mere force of habit. I had a seedling faith that sprang from something that had already been planted within me. It came from somewhere, very early on: my mom tucking me in each night with a prayer, my Sunday school class with its construction paper projects, squirming in the pew on Sunday mornings for that interminable hour next to my parents. Somewhere in there the Holy Spirit grabbed hold of me, and I did not intend to let go of him. I do not remember a conversion so much as a surrounding. As much as my family might have treated overt expressions of faith as a mild embarrassment, the message of the Gospel made it through. In true Baptist fashion, I decided to follow Jesus.

However, the truth was, by the time I reached junior high, there was nothing new about my faith. It had been planted there, by my mom, and her quiet Baptist exertions, and in agonizing fashion I spent a good deal of emotional energy over two or three years working up the courage to walk all by myself to the front of the church, declare my belief, and request baptism in front of the entire congregation. By God (!) the Baptists require a lot of the socially awkward and the painfully shy! Poised on the cusp of puberty, I certainly fell in both of those categories.

But still, once I had made that rite of passage—the awkwardly meaningful episode of full-immersion baptism—I really liked the idea of belonging to a church.  So I was very unhappy when my father decided to walk away from the Baptists,  my mom trailing behind, with what looked like reluctance to me. The congregation had just voted in a new pastor, someone who seemed less like a bookish seminary professor and a lot more like a seventies-style TV evangelist. That was the exit cue for my dad who, as a college professor himself, had always trailed on the academic end of the Southern Baptist world. And maybe by that time, in early middle age, already suffering from career burnout, and not, as he told me later, a natural “joiner,” the idea of shopping around town for a new church just seemed too bothersome to him. So for my parents at least, that marked the beginning of their acquiescence, although not to agnosticism and certainly not to anything that looked or sounded anti-Christian. They gave up on the search. They simply weren’t going to look for their people anymore.

I was only just 16, so their retreat from the church seemed a little unfair to me. I was literally in the process of enlarging my circle, looking for other people with whom I could identify.  Their quirky insistence that the church didn’t meet their standards seemed ill-timed to me. I liked hanging out with the other teenagers in the massive youth room at the First Baptist Church, with its ping pong tables and broken-down sofa pit. And secretly, I really liked Jesus. I wasn’t  interested in giving up on finding Christian community, although I certainly wouldn’t have put it that way. I decided that searching for a place to belong would be my new thing. That led to the somewhat weird phenomenon of a 16-year old girl looking through the Yellow Pages on Saturday night to pick a church to visit on my own the next day. It was a strange kind of freedom for a family to give their teenager, and a strange thing for me to ask: Can I please go to church tomorrow? I knew that I was a religious geek,  but I was determined to find my place.

I went through a few churches in the years to come. Finding the right church home wasn’t easy, especially since I was still unsure about how to weigh out what was truly important: how much did I need to sort out each particular church’s system of beliefs? Wasn’t it more important that I liked the music and that there was a great young adult fellowship group? I wandered from church to church, an earnest, geeky, seeker. And in college that looked right, as the other Christian students on campus were mostly doing the same thing.

I joined the mainline Presbyterian Church, the PCUSA, right after college. But my time there was short, as I moved from one city in North Carolina to another. That’s typical, especially in world of evangelical Protestants. When you move from one city to another, it’s not uncommon to start from scratch, and look at all kinds of churches that offer the basics of biblical Christianity. What’s considered basic? That can vary from person to person, which is why searching for a church home can quickly become such  an oddly personal and capricious exercise. To the Catholic eye, it can seem nonsensical. Leave, the Church sure, there’s plenty of reasons to do that, but to continually look for something better, or at least a better fit for your needs? What? You’re not going on a date, you’re going to church. Decide already: you’re in or you’re out. And in any case, even if you haven’t been inside a church since your niece’s baptism a year ago last June, that’s where you were baptized and raised. You’re Catholic, for chrissakes, that’s your home, even if you only show up for Christmas, Easter, and funerals. From what I’ve observed, the lapsed Catholic isn’t so much angry, as she is happily disinterested.

In contrast, most seekers don’t wear the hat all that happily. They are looking for something that’s missing. Many actually really do want to find a sense of belonging, a sense of being at home in at least a small crowd. So when people church hop, they’re not just seeking God, they are, in some ways, really seeking themselves, or at least they’re seeking a tribe in which they can imagine finding a place to belong. That was true for me, as I made my way through a few years, working my way from a sweet, country Alliance Church in college then on through Presbyterianism. I neither knew nor understood practically anything about the Holiness roots of the former church or the Calvinist roots of the latter. I was a Christian shaped more by the writings of C.S. Lewis and John Stott, and I instinctively knew that sorting out all the rest was going to make it impossible for me to find a home anytime in the foreseeable future. And I was determined to be a joiner.

I ultimately did find a profound sense of home when I converted to Catholicism in my mid-thirties. It offered a comprehensive framework that I could embrace, through the sacraments and through apostolic succession, winding all the way back to the words of Christ: “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.” The frame of the sacraments and the rock of St Peter mattered to me, because even though my family wasn’t anti-Catholic in an aggressive way, my parents were, I guess I could say, phobic about what they knew of the Catholic church. But here were concrete reasons for choosing Catholicism over the other churches I had considered. Its arguments had been hammered out through two millennia, and as one friend, the Jesuit priest who confirmed me, wryly observed, the Church’s apologetic certainly was “elegant.”  I liked its claims to be the true church established by Christ, and the compelling arguments that back up its assertion. I loved the boldness, and even the absolutism that I glimpsed at the edges. It seemed to offer a haven for someone like me who was by this time, tired of searching. On the day of my confirmation, my husband stood behind me with our children, the third one just a baby.

By my side stood my confirmation sponsor, a friend I loved like a sister. A convert as well, she had helped to bring me into the Church, praying her rosaries and lending me cassette tapes from Scott and Kimberly Hahn. On that day, and for a long time to follow, I felt the thrill of my own conversion as keenly as in any account that I’ve read or heard. I was home, and it was miraculous and startling and familiar all at once. And for a time, at least, when I needed it most, the Catholic Church really did feel like home.

My women’s Bible Study met via Zoom this morning, or at least six of us were able to make it. I’m happy that we make a diverse group, age-wise, ranging from the late twenties to (just a guess) members who are likely north of seventy. So our life experiences are varied. Among us, we include women who’ve known family members who were born not long after the Civil War, and we have at least one member who probably can’t even remember what the world was like when there were pay phones on nearly every corner. Together, we represent a shocking span of time, when I think about it.

What unites us most is our commitment to Christ, crucified, died and risen, and a common belief that prayer matters. In these days of Covid-19 (and I know, sadly, that we’re only in the early days) it is important to us to continue to meet together  (virtually)  and to  pray (in reality), not just for ourselves, but for our families, the church, our country, and the world. Believers of all kinds get this. Now we’re really getting the chance to show that we mean it.

I’m grateful for the technology that makes togetherness so possible in this time of being apart. We’re all figuring out just how this can work. My husband has banished himself to our basement playroom, where, early in the week, he set up a big round table and his laptop. It’s all carpeted and nice down there, so I can’t feel so very sorry for him. He can talk on the phone all day long, and keep his business on track, please God. That sense of normalcy reassures me.  Our paths cross most often when I come through with a basket on my way to the laundry, an oddly comforting task. I can stop and blow him a kiss. That’s a nice new change.

Our sixteen-year old is in her room a lot, doing schoolwork, which seems to be in full swing. I make her come out to go on walks, with me or alone. But sometimes, thankfully, I hear her laughing with her friends on Facetime. She invited me in today to say “Hi,” to the group. “I love you guys,” I said. “Here are two questions for you to discuss: How is your relationship with God, and do you have enough toilet paper?”

By this time my daughter was trying to push me out of the door, and her friends were laughing their heads off. “It’s okay!” I reassured her, clapping my hand over her mouth. (Not a social distancing maneuver at all.) There was even more laughter. “Okay,” I said. “Go!” I doubt that they took my advice, but maybe I planted a seed.

I’m looking for the openings, the little ways where I can find an avenue to let God work in bigger ways than I’ve allowed him to work before. Oh, I’m pretty sure that there are going to be plenty of chances to be bold, let go of fear, and to trust him. Even chances to see his mercy through the sadness. I’m beyond worrying about where it’s appropriate to bring up God or faith or my prayer life.

As elsewhere, in our state, the bars and restaurants are closed, all non-essential businesses are moving their workers home, and alarmingly, some are already losing their jobs. My older daughter, a nurse, is concerned that they won’t have the masks and equipment they may need very soon in her hospital. Like everyone, I’m worried about the elderly, and worried about how so many will manage financially. I guess that we’re all praying that the pandemic will pass quickly, and with as little damage as possible. I stay up on the news, as best I can. We all know that the loss has begun. I’m trying to cook better meals with our carefully collected stock of food, and I’m dreaming of the bidet we’ll put in one day when we’re finally able to renovate our master bathroom. Observing myself from a slight distance, I see in my thinking the absurd juxtaposition of the silly and the sublime. Thankfully, this makes me feel a sense of solidarity with my neighbor. I’m guessing that a lot of folks are feeling a lot like me. When is the last time that we all had to face something this big together? Oh, it’s important to hold on to dreams when things look so glum, even if it’s just to ask for the right to maintain minimal standards of hygiene.

But when I’m thinking loftier thoughts, I’m there with all who pray:

Please Lord, comfort those who are the most vulnerable. Give courage to those who are sick, and to those who are alone. Give strength and fortitude to all of those who are on the frontlines, in hospitals and urgent care centers and medical offices. Grant counsel and right judgment to those who are doing everything they can to save our economy from a terrible downturn. In your mercy, Lord, bless us all with the gift of knowledge, to perceive this new reality as only You can see it, and to become a people who turn to You when it is so clear that we need Your help. Help us to be of use to others wherever, and whenever we can. Make us kinder, more patient, and more forgiving. Give us the grace to repent of our own sins, big and small, and release us from our own petty foolishness. Help us in simple piety, to humbly fear You only Lord, but nothing and no one else. Help us, dear Lord, to be courageous before all that is dark, and to do our best to put it into the light.

Come Holy Spirit

Just a couple of months ago, I had a conversation with a very dear, old friend who now lives far away from me and my family. Because we only occasionally talk by phone, and never, ever correspond by email or text, or even with birthday cards, the truth is, we really don’t know each other very well anymore. We have a Facebook kind of relationship, and I know I’m the worse for it. He’s a smart, funny, kind man who has traveled a bit and experienced a lot of life. He’s just fun to be around. He’s also someone, like me, who was raised in the Southern Baptist Church. He went off to a Baptist university in the early 70s, and then never, to my knowledge, was involved with organized religion again. He fits the profile of the Baby Boomer whose college years became the time when he shed the religious beliefs with which he was raised.

But our conversation revealed that my friend does, indeed, have deep opinions about religion, and most of them, as far as I could tell, were negative. That’s how I know he still cares about God. He offered some reasons for not going to church, and for the record, I never asked him to explain why he doesn’t—but gee jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!—there was range in his line of thinking. The two issues that upset him the most went something like this:

Sen. Lindsey Graham is a Baptist, and I can’t understand how the Baptist Church could have let itself be taken over by someone of his ilk, and

Catholics!—What they did in the Middle Ages! Those monks got a hold of stuff and they just twisted everything  and then… His face likewise twisted into a grimace.

Honestly, this outpouring of spiritual frustration left me a little confounded. I care about this person, and I want him to be happy and well, both in body and in spirit. But I’m the kind of single-minded person who buys into the notion that without God in your life, there’s always going to be something missing. That God-shaped void in the human soul that Pascal wrote about—that void is real, as countless have testified, from having experienced it and then finding the only One who can fill it. So I want my friends and family to invite God to dwell there. I truly don’t know of a way to do this all by yourself, for any length of time, without being in communion with other Christians, and by that I mean, by being a real part of a real church. Even in solitude, whether chosen or imposed, what sustains is still the deep connection or commitment to Christ through his Body, the Church. We’re taught that “we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another” (RSV, Romans 12:5). Without a sense that we are, individually, always parts of a mystical whole, we’re left flailing or wandering, limbless or blind.

My friend got me thinking even more about all those who’ve left the practice of going to church behind them. It’s not hard to find a reason to stop going to church if you really don’t want to. I’m pretty sure my friend (who has never been Catholic nor lived in South Carolina) really didn’t have to look that far to convince himself that participating in “organized religion” was unappealing.  Sadly, he’s part of what many are recognizing as a growing exodus from religious practice. The Pew Survey on the Decline of Christianity, published in October of last year, has received a lot of attention in the religious press. It paints a picture of a steady erosion in both Christian practice and belief in the U.S., first taking a dip with the  Baby Boomers, then followed by the Millennials, less than half of whom believe in or practice Christianity. Overall the number of Americans professing Christianity has dropped by 12% in the past decade, to 65%. Church attendance reflects a steady decline as well, with only 49 % of Boomers and 35% of Millennials attending church two or more times a month.

 I think this modern-day exodus may be the biggest problem we’re not really facing in the Church today. Yes, we’ve had a sexual abuse crisis to attend to, and although it’s certainly not the sole cause of lagging church attendance, it has been a contributor. And to be clear, the abuse crisis has been the biggest evil the church has ever encountered— Judas priests fronting as messengers of God.  Maybe I’m naïve, but I’m praying that the worst of that lies behind us, please, God. That can only be a hope, but this I know: the insidious ripple effect of the evil of sexual predation within the Church will outlive us all, even as we seek to leave the abuse behind. And part of what we’ve lost, in many ways, is a sense that we can be communities of faith. Our churches have become fragile places.

So it matters in a lot of ways that we’re losing so many. It’s critical that we understand why, so that we can, in humility, grow stronger in our own faith and then reach out to bring our brothers and sisters, and more urgently, our children, back.

It’s worth noting again that more respondents expressed a belief in Christianity than attend church regularly. There’s certainly room for hope that faith may grow into practice down the line. But it’s probably closer to the truth that once people leave church, faith typically fades, especially when it comes to passing it on from one generation to the next.  When in doubt, it’s easier to give something up than it is to make it a part of your life.  And people can come up with lots of reasons (I’m not saying they all make sense) for giving up their practice of the faith in a church community. Some of the reasons are alarming (the abuse crisis) some surprising (like Lindsey Graham), and some more mundane (lackluster preaching).

But today, considering my friend, I think his real complaint was the hypocrisy in the church. It’s a common gripe, and nothing new, for those who find other activities on Sunday mornings to suppose that going to church makes those in the pews think they’re better than the rest of the world. But I’ve found that nothing could be further from the truth. My friends who are regular churchgoers are the ones who are the most humble and helpful people I know.

So my experience of hypocrisy in the church has mostly been to recognize my own. And this seems right.  We all are trying to do our best, but what church helps us to do is see the sin that’s within, underneath the veneer. Are any of us close to perfect? No. No, no. I went on a women’s retreat last spring attended by hundreds of women from around the country. One especially powerful night, we all took a survey where we anonymously tallied our emotional wounds and them passed them to and fro, and then back and forth from aisle to aisle, until everyone held in her hands a piece of paper containing a checklist of terrible hurts born by someone else in the room, someone she’d likely never meet. We stood, hundreds of women, to represent each other’s pain—the assaults, the broken marriages, the betrayals, the parents and spouses and children lost.

Just to be clear, this wasn’t some kind of support group or healing seminar. It wasn’t an initiation into a twelve-step program. It was a training conference for Catholic women who lead Bible studies in their parishes. We’re the ones who seemingly have our lives together. We’d been to the sacrament of confession the night before, and there we were in a lovely hotel, eating our quinoa salads at lunchtime, then gathering in a big windowless room to discover our brokenness afresh.

Some of the fault for our brokenness could be laid at our own feet. Some was the fault of others. It didn’t matter. It was a powerful moment of unity in prayer for the heavy burdens we all carry. It did not feel like judgment; it certainly did not feel like hypocrisy, as though an imperfect leadership was demanding perfection from its foot soldiers. It felt, instead like a kind of renewed baptism. We stood up from our rose-colored conference chairs, in wave after wave,  a visual embodiment of each other’s pain. I looked at the paper in my hands and heard each item called out. Abortion, alcoholism, emotional abuse, self-loathing…. We all had something to stand for, and pray for, and it felt as though we sailed on an ocean of grace. Later that night, in adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, we placed our burdens at the Lord’s feet, and let them go for one another. Together, we did our best to lay aside the sin and the sadness, and to let those burdens go.

I’ve taken a lot of time to dwell on all of this, because in retrospect, it seemed like my friend was really wrong about what goes on at church, and among churchgoers. I’m sure he carries burdens of his own: some that I’m aware of, but certainly others that I don’t see.  And really, I can’t blame him for his disillusionment, because there’s such a difference when you only read about the Church, any church, from the outside.  From a distance, it becomes difficult not to focus on the scandals, past and present, or to conflate faith with politics. It’s impossible to see through all of the nonsense if you don’t step inside a church for anything other than weddings and funerals.

I wish I could ask my friend to think about it this way: if the church is preaching that we’re all sinners in need of redemption—you know—a crucial point in why we need a Savior–then it stands to reason that everyone there is less than he or she should be. Oh, we’re not just the wounded, we’ve inflicted wounds on the ones we love the most. We’re hypocrites, to be sure, and what’s worse, at times we’ve been liars and cheats, and ingrates as well. Some of us have been terrible to our parents and rotten to our kids. Some of us have had abortions, some of us have left our wives and husbands, and even worse, some of us have been so unbearable that we’ve forced them to go. We’re a miserable lot. We’re not better than the rest of humanity, it’s just that we know where to seek forgiveness for our human condition.

If it bothers you that we’re hypocrites, then be honest, it sort of sounds like you think you’re better than any of us, not worse. Like you’re really too good for church.  It wouldn’t take a lot! I’ve said it now, but I think saying this might hurt, not help. It might feed into the whole narrative of judgment—the very thing I think we should all avoid here.

 But I know that I really belong in church. It helps me to remember that we’re all in good company with the Apostle Paul when he lamented his inability to lay his sin behind him. “I do not do what I want, but the very thing I hate “he also wrote in his letter to the Romans. I can’t think of a better description of me on a bad day, which is somehow very comforting.   But even better yet, I’m encouraged to know that my sin has been conquered by someone who loves me beyond all imagining. I can lay them all down, I can be forgiven and healed. Hypocrite and sinner that I am, I can’t imagine living, or dying, without knowing that.

 I last saw my dear friend at a wedding. I think he wishes he could find God at church; otherwise, I don’t know why he would have expressed such keen disappointment in the faithful, or even in our leaders. I hope that he goes looking for Him there, and I pray that God grants him the eyes of faith to see Christ at work there among his people, the blessed and redeemed hypocrites of his Holy Church.

I read something hopeful today in Terry Mattingly’s column at GetReligion, one of my go-too websites for making sense of the intersection of religion with culture, politics, and the world-at-large. It was about who’s really going to church today, and who’s not.  Turns out that, while lots of church leaders, parents, and lay people of all types, even the unaffliated, have been worried or curious about the “Nones,”—this maddening new cohort of young adults that seems to have left the public practice of religious faith behind them in record numbers—it’s just as clear that it’s middle agers, maybe even older boomers, who are dropping off from church attendance and leaving the pews half empty. Mattingly shows data to illustrate that point, recently analyzed and published by Ryan Burge, a political scientist at Eastern Illinois University, who also happens to be a pastor with the American Baptist Church

 Here’s another illuminating chart from Burge, taking numbers from recent Pew Research findings and using them to project what religious attendance will look like about ten years from now:

At first glance, Burge’s analysis is not so hopeful, I’ll admit, given that his projection indicates that by 2030 a majority of Americans will fall in the category that claims no religious affiliation. Catholics and Evangelicals are currently about neck and neck in church attendance, with each group showing  a slow downward trajectory, while the Nones are rocketing to overtake all categories and take their place as a majority of the population by mid-century, if things continue to progress (or fall apart) at the current rate. Notice that as the Nones climb as a percentage of population, those attending Mainline churches continue to nosedive. That’s clearly where the biggest loss of members is happening.

So where’s the hope? I see a glimmer in Mattingly’s question, “So, let’s ask fearful religious establishment leaders: Are the kids the only problem out there? Maybe the infamous baby boomers have something to do with all of this angst?”

And if the boomers are at the heart of the problem (and haven’t we been at the heart of so many current problems!?!) then maybe there’s hope that Millennials, and GenXers (and so on) will re-examine what’s compelling about religion in the first place, that is, once they really get mired in the  trenches of parenthood or even just start to experience the stress of living as an adult for the whole rest of their lives. Life seems to stretch so far before you when you’re 32 ½ years old! Maybe there’s hope that they’ll discover that all of life’s answers aren’t to be found in your work life or even your personal life, and certainly not in your political leanings. Julia Duin (another great columnist at GetReligion) points out in her comment for Mattingly’s column that it’s during their thirties that people tend to return to church, after leaving in their late teens. In fact, she wrote a book about it, called, Quitting Church. I haven’t read it, but I’d like to. And I’m hoping (and praying) that Duin is right.

As she also points out, her research revealed that it’s not just the young and marginally attached who give up on church. Duin writes:

That is, it’s not huge news that 20-somethings aren’t in church because they tend to return to church in their 30s and stay there the rest of their lives. What I discovered is that the bulwark of church attendance: The over-50 set, which were the boomers, were dropping out. And not just the spiritually lukewarm ones. Some of the strongest Christians had just had it with the inanities of so many churches and had walked away. [Emphasis mine.] That is still happening. I’d say half or more of my babyboomer cohorts are no longer in church. The ones who still attend often force themselves to go.

As I see it, that’s actually good news, because it’s a strong indicator that it’s quite possible that the best hope the Church (any Christian church)  has of reaching new generations with the Gospel is to stop trying so hard to be “relevant” and to simply preach the Good News, in one of its orthodox iterations. As a Catholic, I’m not always sure that the Church, on the ground, holds to preaching the Gospel and making disciples as its top priorities. On many sides, we’ve got trouble, extending from River City to the Vatican.

 But, if one generation fails, that means another generation can turn things around. That’s my fervent, prayerful, never-ending hope.