The last time I went to church for myself was Sunday, June 28th, 2015. Two days after the victorious decision on Obergefell v. Hodges. I think I needed to see for myself.
Apart from a couple years spent in Norway, I attended the same church my entire childhood. I felt at home there. Every week I looked forward to Sunday school and children’s church. I loved that I lived down the street from church so I could attend both services when my parents often left after the first. Although it was a casual church, I looked forward to the opportunity to dress up. I found a place for myself taking care of babies and toddlers in the nursery. Church was also where I spent time with some of my best friends. Most Sunday services were a catalyst for a playdate.
It was not just about socializing and activities, though. I was invested. As I got older, I sat in on “big church.” Sometimes I took notes and other times I just listened. Either way I was engaged and actively applying instances in my life to the lessons. How had I behaved in the previous week? What could I learn to act differently? At times I felt conflicted between my secular and sacred worlds. This is especially challenging when your evangelical church tells you that it’s your responsibility to “save” the non-Christians in your life. I also wondered how I happened to be born into the religion that knew the “one true God” and others thought the same thing about their god, but were wrong? Yet, I pushed aside these cognitive dissonances (though I often cry-prayed for my atheist friends) and overall felt connected to my church.
The trouble with attending one church your whole life is, it’s very hard to replace when you move away. Churches, especially non-denominational churches, have unique vibes and programs. When I went to college, I tried to find a new church home. One church was tiny and half-filled with very old people. Another was too wishy-washy with the scripture for my taste, but also very liturgical. It felt like a jarring juxtaposition.
I ended up attending Catholic mass for most of my freshman year. It felt so foreign that I didn’t compare it to the church I had grown up in. I enjoyed the weekly walks with friends, an opportunity to dress up. Sunday morning breakfasts were quiet, while most others on campus were still sleeping. I enjoyed holding hands during the Lord’s Prayer and greeting other congregants. Though I felt uncomfortable with all the kneeling, and didn’t take communion. Inexplicably, I also spent a lot of time crying.
I think the tears were an indication of what was to come.
In the years that followed, many things led to my unraveling faith. College exposed me to more ideas, cultures, and ways of thinking. As is typical of both the college years and Whitman students, my ideology shifted. I could no longer believe in an omnipotent god that allowed innocent people to suffer, or that those who lived in the far reaches of the world and had not heard of Jesus would perish eternally. I learned other origin and flood stories and that the gospels were written decades after Jesus’ death, previously being passed down orally. Rather than seeing it as the direct word of God, I started to believe the bible was full of useful stories and lessons (as well as other not-so-useful stories and lessons). I also felt abandoned by God when my depression was at its worst. That created the largest fissure in our relationship.
I used to sleep outside in the summer. Hood River doesn’t normally get rain between July 4th and the end of August. I set up a mattress with bedding on the back deck, so I could gaze at the stars while falling asleep. I liked having the sun gradually wake me. It was lying there on the deck one night between my second and third year of college that I realized I was gay. Staring at the stars, wondering how I made it so long without realizing. In that moment I felt a crawly skin, embarrassed, uncomfortable feeling – a relief to my previous numbness – and I felt shocked, amused, and dumbfounded.
I also knew instantly and instinctually that one of two things was true. Either the god I had always believed in was real and made me gay and loved me for it, or he didn’t exist. There is no world in which a loving, creationist god makes gay people and then wants them to change. Once I knew I was gay, there was no doubt in my mind that loving and being with someone of the same gender was not a sin.
Please allow me to take this moment to apologize to all the people I hurt before I came out. I’m sorry it took my own experience to learn this. I wish I could have opened my mind and heart earlier. I do take this lesson with me, acknowledging that I won’t understand everything people go through, but my lack of experience doesn’t invalidate theirs.
Learning this about myself was weird and awkward and for many years made me feel separated from my family. But I never once hated myself or wanted to make myself straight. For that I am grateful.
I stopped looking for a church to attend. Now they needed to be gay-affirming, on top of the impossible standard of culture, music, size, service-length, demographic, and a belief system that was somehow monotheistic as well as self-aware and non-exclusive. I wanted to feel like I was going to my childhood church, but I didn’t want the cognitive dissonance associated with knowing there were people all over the world confidently gathering in their sacred places and believing different things. I had outgrown church but wanted that sense of home.
When the supreme court ruled gay marriage legal in 2015, I had recently graduated and was living at home again in Hood River. I had been to a couple services, I think, in the preceding weeks, but I needed to go that Sunday.
I will never forget sitting in the pew with some friends – I never sat on that side of the church. Although there were people all around me, I felt so vulnerable and exposed. I remember sitting in the pew, tears streaming down my face, wishing I had an aisle seat so I could more easily escape, hearing the pastor compare same-sex marriage to any other sin we all commit. My heart was breaking. I felt betrayed. And I was certain in that moment that I was unwillingly coming out. I knew it was over and I would never come back. It did not matter anymore where I landed on the God/Jesus thing, because I would never feel safe there.
I still have fond memories of my childhood church, but I also have the flawed parts, the people I hurt because of what I believed, and the painful ending.
In those days I used to think about my beliefs constantly. I read so many memoirs, trying to figure out exactly where I landed. I think I wanted my own faith manifesto. Now I don’t think about it too often.