Life isn't easy sometimes... More often than not, events and people can get under your skin if you aren't careful, and then you have to deal with issues outside of yourself. This really worries me, as I have trouble enough dealing with issues inside myself let alone those outside. This also really worries me because when I have too many difficulties outside my normal levels of crazy, I like to start taking it out on everyone else, such as in the past little while with my grad application. I then end up doubling or tripling the average amount of critical, cynical commentary which comes out of my mouth while decreasing the constructive statements I enjoy giving but for which I at times lack generative ability.
In the weeks (more than month) between my last post and this one, I thought of putting up different kinds of topics, most of which I could talk about in my full-boar cynicism and wit.
Yet I really didn't want to. Raving about the inadequecies of life is fun, but probably not worth spending the time writing onto a blog, especially if I'm only updating it every month or so. My existence isn't long enough to dwell endlessly on the unhopeful things in life without taking hold of what might be done or is already happening to rectify the situation, so I hope that is conveyed from now on.
I'm done with dwelling on these irrelevant past issues to which I've died many times over, yet can't ever seem to get away from.
So I ask the questions what's church to you? and what does home mean to you?
I ask of course because, in my little world, the feeling of home has no definition. I may feel at home wherever I am, or perhaps I actually feel lost all the time, but I cannot remember what it felt like to have a permanent, identifiable home which one "belongs" to.
I would like to say that my home is where I feel accepted and understood (loved) by everyone around me, where I recognize everything even if I haven't been there for a really long time. God so often gives me that feeling when I don't expect to have it, but at times being in our culture of individuality and isolation reminds me that no matter who I am with, the amount of closeness required for such a wonderful feeling of comfort is still somehow out of reach. And this applies everywhere I go: public transit, lecture halls, restaurants... They all seem to perpetuate this idea that we are all separate beings, all so distinct that to act as though we're interconnected is to feel like an outcast; this ultimately leads me to feel like a stranger in a foreign world, constantly where I may not belong.
I'm not sure where I could get that feeling of understanding, of recognition, of being connected to everyone but still know who I am in God's creation... I guess that's what I want the church to be: home.
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2 comments:
Is church home? I mean... you want it to be that way... is it?
If it isn't... why not?
I was thinking this week, after talking to you guys about the stuff happening at my church lately, how I kept saying "we" and "us" and "our" (and even now I just wrote "my church" like it's something that I am still part of even though really, I haven't been involved for a long time now...) Somehow, COTR is still "home" to me. The thing is... It doesn't seem to matter which church I go to (anywhere in the world so far) they all remind me of "home" because the same connection is always there... The same basic blue-print of what it means to be a church...
Anyway.
I had a lot more 'response' to this post, but it's so much that I can't seem to figure out how to put it into words. Hence the long delay in actually commenting. I don't want to ramble though, so:
"The End"
Interestingly enough, you said "my" church, denoting singular possessive. The individuality in our culture is so strong that subconsciously sometimes it's easy to assume that a piece of the church is owned by the individual.
I can't really say why church isn't home, simply that it may or may not feel that way, but I can't remember what this nebulous "home" feels like. People don't know me well in church, perhaps of my own device, perhaps of theirs. Whichever it is, it doesn't matter, the base idea remains that, if people do not know you, it is difficult for them to understand or really accept you. In addition, where I am now is not where I will be in a few years' time, and after that I'll be somewhere else, so if I am to call anything "home" it would have to be something that fits my nomadic lifestyle, which comes down to the bottom line of the church not yet feeling like home, except in those moments when I actually feel connected to others as believers (a sadly all-too-often fleeting feeling).
Among the many experiences I have outside my family, though, church is still the closest thing I can find to what I want to label as home, but at the same time I cannot identify it that way.
I do believe that church can feel that way; Maybe just call me a hopeless optimist, I suppose.
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