Leaving A Church

I grew up in the Church of the Nazarene.  I've got Nazarenes on both sides of my family going back several generations, and on my Dad's side there's also quite a few in the Salvation Army, which has a close affinity to the Nazarenes.  That church was pretty much my whole identity as a child all the way beyond college.  There are pastors and (now retired) missionaries in my family.  My wife and I both worked at the Nazarene headquarters in Kansas City, at Korea Nazarene University at I've been a "dorm dad" at MidAmerica Nazarene University.  I've gone on mission trips, to conventions and General Assemblies.  I had a part-time job driving HQ personnel to and from the airport - it was cheaper to run our own transportation service than to pay for parking and mileage.  So I got to know General Superintendents (think Archbishops), ministry heads, pastors of large churches, etc. 

We attend an Episcopalian church now, and have made a break with the Nazarene denomination.  And it still hurts.  I still have a hard time thinking that my children will probably not go to my alma mater, that they won't have a natural connection to it like I did before I went.  Leaving a church that has formed you as a person is a painful, difficult decision.

So the news that Michelle and Barack Obama have decided to sever their ties with Trinity UCC in Chicago is hard to hear.  You might think that I'd condemn them for that action, but even if I weren't disqualified from such action by my own church history, I wouldn't do that to them now.  Whatever Barack Obama's problems, he and Michelle have always struck me as very sincere in their religious beliefs, and because of that I believe that they and their daughters are really hurting right now, feeling adrift, unconnected.  It's going to make the rest of this campaign pretty hard.

The GOP will of course say that it's just a campaign stunt.  They are, of course, wrong.  When Trinity hosted Michael Pfleger, it was a shot across Obama's bow from the congregation itself, not just Jeremiah Wright.  What Pfleger said - and visiting pastors always let the host pastor(s) know at least the general outline of the sermon ahead of time - and the congregation's enthusiastic agreement was more of an attack on Obama than it was Hillary.  It was a statement of support for the most extreme things Wright said after his infamous sermons.

Instead of just supporting him as a person, Trinity UCC made it clear that they were going to inject themselves into this campaign over and over again, and that's unacceptable.  I think they decided that Obama needed some prophetic - and public - exhortation.  That's wrong, of course.  What Barack, Michelle, Malia and Natasha need is a shepherd, and some brothers and sisters.  Trinity UCC's congregation made a choice to put political statements above a 20 year relationship, above the spiritual needs of an entire family.

Bill Hybels is fond of saying, "There is nothing like the local church when the church is working right."  Unfortunately, the opposite is also true. 

I really hope the Obamas are ok, and that they have other relationships to help fill the void until they can get some semblance of stability back in their lives.

Comments

[Corvus9]

I think there are basically two kinds of church membership in the U.S. right now. There's the generational, "this is my church, my family's church, as it has always been," and the more postmodern, "this is where I have arrived on my spiritual journey" type of membership.

I don't really know about Michelle's background, but Barack I think is somewhere between the two. His generational background is areligious, so he had to come to the church. But he has been there for so long now, it must really feel like home now, like his. It's not like he tried out buddhism for a year or two then went back to being Catholic, or something. So, I think the way they are dealing with it is closer to Stephen's experience than your normal lost weekend religious jaunt.

There are perfectly good reasons for questioning the ingenuousness of many aspect of Obama and his campaign—he is definitely not some saintly political, immune to manipulative political tactics—but I think if there is anything honest about Obama, it is his world view. The idea of "change from the bottom up," his view of America as an experiment in democracy, all the stuff in the "More Perfect Union speech," the idea that there is more that Americans have in common that in difference. I think he believe all that stuff. So to see the Church he belongs to reject his worldview, a worldview that is in no small part, is perhaps even grounded in his faith...that must really hurt. So yeah, I definitely think the decision itself has not politically motivated, though I think the timing of the announcement might have been (there's those "manipulative political tactics" I was talking about).

[Scott K]

I agree with you on that. I myself grew up in the Catholic Church, and when I was young, my family went to an inner-city parish that was predominantly African-American and was very dynamic. Unfortunately, with the cash flow issues that the archdiocese was having, they decided to merge several inner-city parishes into one bigger church and save on the facility costs. At that time, my parents chose to change churches so we could go to one significantly closer. The new church turned out to be a older and more traditional community. I did develop a strong attachment to the youth minister for that church, but he himself wasn't a permanent member of that congregation. Ultimately, I wound up choosing to pursue a different theological path entirely. My sister tends towards Unitarian Universalist, and my brother is dabbling in Hindi practice. My parents now go to yet another church (you guessed it-- another merger) but at least that one seems younger and more dynamic. I sometimes wonder what might have happened if my family had the option of staying in the first parish throughout all of our childhood.

With reference to Jeremiah Wright, I agreed with a lot of what he had to say-- but when I watched his speech at the Nat'l Press Club, some of what he said was perfectly fine with me (though others might not agree) but some of it left me believing that Obama had no choice except to renounce the man-- he had left no eye of the needle to be threaded. Indeed, that happened soon afterwards. And now this. One problem with becoming a vessel for others to put their hopes and dreams in is that you may find that some of the hopes and dreams that wind up in you aren't what you expected.

[Sir Charles]

Corvus,

I think the two categories of church you describe are quite apt -- the church of family and tradition and that of spiritual journey -- but I think there is at least one more, which is the exurban megachurch. I think these churches may be part of some people's spiritual journey; but for many I think they simply are the only institution that fills an enormous void of community in otherwise alienating places. (Which is not to say that many are not enormously destructive in terms of their ideological predilections -- but simply to acknowledge the place they play in a lot of these communities.)

I think Obama had no choice but do what he did -- he simply couldn't remain hostage to whatever crazy crap might issue from the next preacher in the pulpit.

I left the Catholic Church at the age of 16 due to what I perceived as intolerable hypocrisy and completely unrealistic policy positions vis a vis divorce and birth control. I've never looked back.

[Bulworth]

Welcome to the Episcopal fold, Stephen. I grew up Seventh Day Aventist, went to their schools, still have most my family and friends in the SDA church, etc, but now attend an Episcopal church. I'm 41 now and just started making the switch in the last year.