Each week during our "Share the Message, Share our Message" campaign, a member of our congregation will share their message about why First Congregational is such a special place. Some of these messages will be archived on the menu to the right.
 Good morning! I have to admit that I feel a little awkward to give the first of these testimonials. I feel that way because, when I sat down to think about what I was going to say, I began by asking myself, “What makes this church so special to me?” And I came up with a surprising realization: I did not actually come to this church looking for something special. In fact, I came looking for quite the opposite: I came looking for a church where my family and I, without being just like everyone else, would be “nothing special.” And, that’s what we have found, and that’s what I love so much about this community. Let me explain:
By the time Sam, the girls and I first showed up here about four years ago, I had had more than enough of churches that treated our family as something special. This first struck me in the Orthodox Church of which the girls and I used to be members, shortly after Lydia was baptized. A baby boy was baptized around the same time, then carried, according to Orthodox tradition, behind the icon screen into the sacred space around the altar. But not Lydia: she remained outside that space, which was reserved for boys and men. Intellectually, I had known this was the case and had rationalized it, but the injustice of it only hit me when I saw my own daughter left outside.
It struck me again later when Eleanor expressed an interest in becoming an acolyte and growing up to be a priest. I was at a loss how to explain to her that, for girls in our church, this just wasn’t possible. Like most in that church, I was reluctant to give voice to the underlying assumption: That there was something “special” about girls, something specially unholy that kept them outside the most sacred spaces.
Later, in the Episcopal Church the girls and I began attending around the time I met and started falling in love with Sam, about the time that we were beginning to realize we were going to commit to each other for life, I sat in the pews watching a man and woman go up for an anniversary blessing. And, I found myself thinking, “Well, here we go again. What happens when the girls ask me, ‘Daddy, how come you and Sam aren’t married? Why don’t you go up for a blessing?’” How was I to explain that? Or maybe worse, what if they never asked that? What if they grew up taking it for granted that our family was just too different—too “special”—to be blessed or given public affirmation as a family like any other?
So, we came here. And, as I said, we were looking for nothing special: Just the chance to be one other couple, one other family, four other people no more or less worthy of special treatment than anyone else. And, thank God, that’s what we have found: a community where there is nothing special to prevent us from being included in the common blessings.
The first day we showed up, Sam and I were pulled into dozens of friendly conversations. Denise went out of her way to greet the girls and offered them pew pals, stuffed animals they have treasured ever since. Almost immediately, the girls were made to feel like valued participants in Adventure Village and the Youth Group. Within a matter of weeks, Baylis had sussed out my interests and invited me to play an active role in the adult classes. It wasn’t but a year before Sam was invited to join the trustees.
And when Sam and I, just a few months after our arrival, invited you all to celebrate and witness our exchange of life vows here at church, you accepted, showering us with the same support, offering the same council as I have since seen you offer many others, be it long-standing active members like Franji, or those much newer to our community. Your generosity was overwhelming, but as I came to understand with even more profound gratitude later, it was truly, for this community, nothing special. Here, these are common blessings, offered to all.
It is a great joy to me to know that everyone who comes through the doors of this church—male or female; married our single; old or young; with or without children; gay or straight; poor or rich, struggling with mental or physical disabilities or differences, or not; of whatever hue of skin, accent, or cultural background, is going to be received with the same warmth of welcome, the same eagerness to affirm and receive whatever gifts they have to offer, and the same patience for their foibles, as Sam, the girls and I continue to receive.
There shouldn’t be anything special about all that; that’s just taking the Gospel seriously. But, sadly, that does make this community special among local churches. Just down the road there is a church that was recently excluded from fellowship within its denomination for having dared to merely consider—and ultimately reject!—the possibility of allowing same-sex couples to be photographed alongside other families. The vast majority of churches in our area—even the most “progressive”—follow rules that send the message to families like ours that there is something “special” about them that prevents them from participating in the full life and ministries of the church.
But, not here. Here, truly, whoever you are and wherever you are on life’s journey, you are welcome. And for that, I am very specially thankful. |
