Walls of my heart is written down (forgive the title, I was oozing a neurasthenic and self-absorbed romanticism at the time I wrote it).
Aiee! I am back in the swing of things with church, what with the potential move and the satellite service, so I invited myself to the growth committee meeting. Actually, I hosted it last night. Keith made himself known to everybody (feeling safe to come out if Peggy and I are in the room) and I (scandalously, for a Unitarian) didn’t feed snacks afterwards because one of our number is fasting for a genuine health reason and I figured we could all get by on clear fluids rather than force her to watch us eat. That is the first time I ever had a committee or small group ministry meeting at my house without food – and my Mennonite foremothers are rotating like cylinder records in their graves at the very thought.
In the old days, visitors would be fed ‘faspa’ which is the Mennonite equivalent of tiffin, and consists of something lighter than a meal and heavier than a snack, if you know what I mean. It’s so much part of the culture that it’s a major faux pas not to provide it. Even though I had a sound reason, I still felt guilty. Ah, it’s so good to be back in church!
Why the hell does an atheist do church?
Well, let’s face it. Until we get all the Jews, Catholics, Muslims, Jains, Sikhs, Buddhists and people who believe G-d made the world 6K years ago on the same reality oriented page, we have a number of choices. We can read books by atheist authors and mock fundies in the privacy of our own homes; we can grab the torch of full civil rights for atheists and run with that for a while; we can quietly go about our business while other atheists carry the can for the culture war without bothering to learn anything new or engage anyone; or we can try, among many other difficult matters, a really really hard thing, which is figuring out how atheists and theists can live in community by acknowledging, among other shared challenges, our common humanity, our fragile planet, and the needs of those less educated, less healthy, and less undeservedly wealthy.
Also, church is loads of fun. When I get tired of being polite to people – which is usually what makes me withdraw for a while, as I am quite a rude individual in spots, although I average out civil over time – I go away and think about it, but I always come back. And Sue is the President now, and she and I get along well, so I am hopeful. Stay tuned while we adjust our reality set. We may have different space in November!
