The One True Church

I was sitting in church today, pondering a question a guy from the singles group asked me last weekend after I had mentioned my, ahem, "liberal" views.

"So why are you still in the Church of Christ?" he asked.
"Good question," I said.

So why am I still in the Church of Christ? It's not something I set out to do, it just sort of. . .happened. I decided that I'd start visiting Churches of Christ in the area, and if I didn't find one I liked, I'd move on to Episcopal (because they ordain women) and community churches.

Here's what I told the guy:
"Well, I guess it comes down to music, really. I was raised non-instrumental, and it's what I prefer. And besides, if I went somewhere else, then who would get my Church of Christ jokes?"

The truth is that I found a church where the singles group seemed to want to get to know me, and cared if I came back or not. It is also the most multicultural church I have visited in the area and committed to sticking around in order to engage the increasingly urban area around it, and those things are important to me. There is a lot of work to do there and a chance for me to use some of my gifts (even if I have to keep that "teaching" one under wraps).

It's odd to me that I ended up at a pretty conservative church. No one in class asks me to lead the prayer or start a song, and I don't want to damage anybody's faith by volunteering to do that (at least not yet). I don't stay for the preaching, and the worship is, well, pretty white, even if all of the congregation isn't. For example, in worship this morning we sang that song Restore, (Restore my spirit, Lord, I need restore, my cup is empty, refill it dear Lord, replace all doubts and fears with faith so bold, renew my love, rebuild my faith, oh restore my soul) and I started laughing quietly because it was just so white. I love these people, but they don't have much soul. We're working up to that.

I'm the token liberal in our singles class, and it's pretty hard on me already. I'm depending on my non-conservative friends and family members to talk to me enough so I can go back to church every week and be the one liberal. (Thanks for inviting me over last night, Kim--that was a great dose of liberalism, and fun to boot!)

And I'm thinking that I'm pretty much killing my chances of finding a husband here in the good ol' CoC. A lot of that liberal stuff I'm willing to bargain on, but not on the breakdown of power in a marriage. I think it should be 50-50 (I'll provide the gory details if you want them), and I'm afraid that it's going to be hard to find a CoC guy who feels the same, and that's, as Dr. Phil would say, a "deal breaker" for me.

That's not the only thing that's going to make it hard for me to find a husband, though. I have recently decided that giving birth to babies is not the best decision. Let me say that I have always wanted to be pregnant because I think it would be just the coolest thing ever, but it seems pretty selfish to me to have a baby just because I want to know what it's like. I guess I should explain why I feel this way:

1. The world sucks, no doubt about it. It is full of wars, hate, school shootings, soaring gas prices, cancer, heartache and traffic jams. Why bring an innocent kid into that?
2. The world is also becoming overpopulated--there are too many people and not enough resources, and it's just going to get worse.
3. There are lots of babies who no one wants and who will have to grow up without people to love them, and they will more than likely just further that cycle of war and hate without any guidance. I will only have so many resources when it comes time to raise kids, and will only be able to care for so many. If I have my own, then I will have less resources to devote to kids without anyone else to love them.

So how can I justify making new babies when there are so many good reasons against it? I still want to have kids and I still REALLY want to have my own, but I'm just not sure it's the best idea. (I'm hoping to work through this so I'll feel okay about having my own babies, but I'm not seeing that happen.) How many good CoC boys are going to be okay with that? (Although for those of you who know about that one guy in the singles group who is trying to make me his "special friend," apparently that doesn't matter to everyone. I hate my love life, but glad y'all find it so amusing. I'm never being nice to anyone again!)

Plus, I'm thinking the way we do church is not really the way God intended it to go. Twice over the past week I had an opportunity to help out and encourage two people in some pretty creative ways, and although the situation one of them finds himself in left me feeling sad at the state of the world, helping them did feel good and right. I thought, "Now THAT'S what church is all about," even though neither of them are technically members of the church I attend. Perhaps more on their situations later.

So for now I'm going to keep attending my CoC and trying to love people like crazy. I've joined the apartment ministry, and will probably get to relive some of my MY days (without all the kids knocking on the door at all hours of the day and night), and I'm excited. I'll keep you posted, even you Church of Christers. (I wanted to abbreviate that one, but it CoCers sounded sort of dirty. Oh well.)