Yesterday, I made the difficult decision to postpone the long-planned futuring event we had planned after worship this Sunday. It had been advertised and promoted since mid-June. The goal is to explore what the "future church" will be.
The final clue that we needed to postpone is that of those who had made a reservation (needed because it involved serving a catered lunch AND a children's program happening simultaneously to keep the wee ones engaged elsewhere in the building), only 3 households represented were under the age of 65. This is NOT representative of the group that affiliates with the congregation. We have families with young children. But our efforts to engage those households in this process clearly failed.
I've been meeting on and off with younger families (that's a loose term when used by a pastor in her sixth decade of life) about living in this Post-Covid world. It hit me last evening that I'm straddling a huge wall, two different world views.
The Church as institution with committees/teams/boards/structure and formal worship through which relationships, connections, and growth are fostered, and stone walls that set the boundaries. This institution is accustomed to long range planning with goals and objectives, and measurable outcomes. The Church recognizes that things have changed and there is no going back to "the way it used to be," but also is yearning for the stability of the past; change is instability and The Church needs the change to be done so things can feel stable again.
and
The Community where "pods" and "circles" foster connection, relationships, and growth. The Community looks for an unfolding, organic future. The Community wants space and will make do minimal supports in place, space where community can be real and authentic, not just a dream or vision. The Community is longing for what can be. Further, in the Community, there is great resistance to all things institutional and structured.
The part of me standing in "the Church" understands that this institution needs a chaplain.... someone to attend to the anxiety of impending change. "The Church" part of me needs the assurance that there IS a future and struggles to admit (let go of control by admitting) I don't know how to create it. And so, this part of me is also struggles with how to interact with "the Community" and gain the insights so desperately needed to set the direction of what "The Church" will become: dead or reinvented. ((The control freak in me grabs for 3 more Prozac.))
The part of me standing in"The Community" struggles with the idea of maintaining"the institution" but wants an alternative to be evident; This part of me needs an entrepreneurial "church planter" to innovate and energetically explore new possibilities. This part of me desperately needs to get out of the structures and methodologies of the past because they mean nothing to me.
I am straddling both worlds and feeling schizoid. I just don't know HOW to be both a chaplain AND a church planter. I am torn, trying to do both, and exhausting myself in the attempt.
So being blunt (beyond direct), The Church side of me laid out this quandary to The Community side of me and asked how to move forward with re-creating/re-inventing this community/church post covid. There was no response.
And the Community side of turned to the Church side of me and asked why such structure and stability are necessary. And there was no response.
Maybe I am just too old to be doing this.
The morning after cancelling the long-planned futuring event, I awakened in the wee hours with a vivid dream. The big stone church building had morphed into a person in labor. There was panting and screaming, and the stones were crumbling around them as they breathed through transition and moved into the Push stage of labor. I woke up from this dream screaming, "Breathe! Let it out slowly! Push!" I could not see what was being born.
As anyone who has given birth can tell you, labor and birth are not fun. They are painful, messy, scary, and uncontrollable experiences. The Church and the Community are gestating a new life, a new being for a new age. The gestation could be several human generations long. It could be shorter. We just don't know. And we don't know what to expect, how to plan for. We certainly cannot force the labor and birth. Yes, the stones are falling around us. Yes, the change cannot happen quickly enough. But each of us is both coach and expectant parent. All we can do is breath through the contractions, the pain, the mess and await the birth of God's new incarnation.
"Behold I do a new thing. Now it springs forth. Do you not perceive it?"
gracias por escuchando/leyendo.
