A Study in Membership: Part 01

Happy Thanksgiving!

I was just thinking about the things for which I am thankful when I realized, "I am a member of a church." 

I am not surprised that I am a member of a church. I am not surprised that churches have members (I mean, like official members). I am, however, surprised that I am a member of a church (yes, the tone in which that statement is said differs a great deal from its non-tone twin). 

Someone once described me as 'humbly jaded' because despite being jaded, I am open to new perspectives; in fact, I crave new perspectives, because I have hidden behind mine often enough to know what a- a donkey I can be. 

Admittedly, I should not be so surprised to be a member of a church. I was a member of my previous church. But that's just it. My previous church, I'd attended since I was in kindergarten. I became a member at thirteen (right?) and only left earlier this year for publicly-undisclosed reasons (reasons which have been privately-disclosed among trusted ears). 

Looking for a church these past, what, six-seven months (two of which were spent at a summer camp sans automobile), I found it difficult to belong because I have a complicated relationship with belonging.

Even before I was looking for a church, any time I visited one I was quick to judge it. Not for its theology, or for its lack of organ music, but for its appearance. It's physical, shallow appearance. Not because my home church was just so phenomenal--hardly. But I've always thought it odd how modern American churches insist community without, actually, you know, communing. 

Now, I am not an expert on modern American churches. I haven't even read a David Platt book. Augh. But I have only visited American churches. I have neither the funds nor vehicles to visit churches outside of America...outside of the tri-state area. 

Ferrealsies, though, what does it mean to greet and make new people feel welcome? How do I just accept them and make them feel a part of the community? Because I know when I'm a new person I don't really want you to greet me. I want you to let me sit back for a couple weeks and let me decide whether or not I want you to approach me. Approach me when I'm ready. When it's not my first day. When I have had a chance to swim through jades. When I've had a chance to stop judging you. When I've had a chance to settle in.

Maybe it's because I'm introverted.

I hear churches speak of community without reaching out to it. Or, reaching out to the immediate community.

Down the street from where I live there's a Mormon church which has never reached out to me or my household. A few miles away is a Presbyterian church which has never reached out to me. I am not suggesting these churches are not fulfilling what they purport to be their duty: I have visited neither and do not know the ministries in which they are involved. I am sure (or would like to be sure) that both reach out to their flock, and to the newcomers that do visit.

But what if, in certain cases, as a church, you can only reach out to those who choose to reach out to you? What I mean is, what if the American church isn't 'affecting' its closest neighbors because it has a skewed or exclusive perspective of 'international'. No, I know there are a bajillion blog posts written about helping at home before helping abroad. I've read those. I have been a part of those movements. I'm wondering if maybe that's not so bad. 

Just because a church starts in a certain area with the intent to help that certain area because that's God's thing doesn't mean that will happen. What if when I visit a church, like when I meet a person on the street, I was only meant to visit once, and my not coming back is not a tragedy, but a blessing. 

I am choosing to attend and be a member of a church that is fifteen minutes away, instead of one that is five minutes away. Am I the only one that thinks this is funny? Nothing is wrong with the church that's five minutes away, but where did I feel I could best serve; where did I feel most welcome, most safe? Fifteen minutes away- a church I'd never heard of before. 

Is their lack of publicity and my lack of acknowledging its existence a problem? 

No, but I think too often modern American churches make it a problem because we don't understand that, as a church, we can only reach out to so many people in a certain area. We can only positively (or negatively) impact a community as much as it is willing to allow impact. 

Perhaps the church five minutes away from me is consistently positively impacting a community thirty minutes away- a community it didn't expect to impact. 

And now, as an official member (I have a fancy certificate and everything) will I be okay with that? Will I be able to participate in that? Will I add or detract from my new home church. Will I be brave enough to say 'hello' to the veteran members? Will I now say 'hello' to new members who, too, might be humbly jaded? 

Churches may intend to affect their immediate surrounding area, but sometimes, that just isn't what God has in mind. I live fifteen minutes away from my church's surrounding area (that may not seem like very far away, but to some it is)- I can't imagine I was part of my church's plan.  But then, that's the beauty of it all, right? 

So, I'm a member of a church who's intentions, though stated clearly, are subject to divine intervention. Excuse me, I have to go figure out what that really means. If you want to see what I make of church membership, look out for Parts 02, 03, 04- maybe Parts determined indefinite. 

Holla. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

modern, right? ehehe,

without skin

i think like the rest of the reading world i have fallen in love with Stephen Collins' The Gigantic Beard that was Evil. it's incredibly hard not to love it. just like the back of the book says "totes surreal- like ferrealsies." really, that's what the back of the book said, and you can always trust what the back of the book says about the inside of a book.

duh.

i was so incredibly enthralled by this book i wrote a poem.

if you haven't read it you'll still understand my poem. if you have, however, read it, then, well, you'll understand my poem.

if you have my poem, thank you for keeping it.

ahem, here it is ::

i am here
but i am from there,
and i have taken there to here.
because i thought it looked very similar.
i thought it met the standard.

you are here
but you are from there.
a there different from mine.

my here [is] your there.
your here, my there.

also someone else's.

a matter of perspective, location, relation.
labeled, re-labeled; then ignored,
buried under sheets and dirt and plastic and stone.
to be discovered later by someone
who will think it's from there,
though it's been here
before someone was.

yes, someone who will bring there to here
though it already was.

i am here.

"There are no foreign lands. It is the traveler only who is foreign." -Robert Louis Stevenson

In Half- Half-Truths

this past week i've jotted down ideas that've possessed me with the intention of expanding those ideas here in my blog, but either (1) i haven't had time or (2) i didn't know how to expand those ideas. let's go wit (3) both of the above!

so, here we go.

I periodically listen to the radio theatre version of the Chronicles of Narnia (and i still cry every time I hear it.) I got around to listening to The Magician's Nephew and heard this part with new ears:

"Son of Adam," said Aslan, "you have sown well. And you, Narnians, let it b e your first care to guard this Tree, for it is your Shield. The Witch of whom I told you has fled far away into the North of the world; she will live on there, growing stronger in dark Magic. But while that Tree flourishes she will never come down into Narnia. She dare not come within a hundred miles of the Tree, for its smell, which is joy and life and health to you, is death and horror and despair to her."

Everyone was staring solemnly at the Tree when Aslan suddenly swung round his head (scattering golden gleams of light from his mane as he did so) and fixed his large eyes on the children. "What is it, children?" he said, for he caught them in the very act of whispering and nudging one another.

"Oh--Aslan, sir," said Digory, turning red, "I forgot to tell you. The Witch has already eaten one of those apples, one of the same kind that Tree grew from." He hadn't really said all he was thinking, but Polly at once said it for him. (Digory was always much more afraid than she of looking a fool.)

"So we thought, Aslan," she said, "that there must be some mistake, and she can't really mind the smell of those apples."

"Why do you think that, Daughter of Eve?" asked the Lion.

"Well, she ate one."

"Child," he replied, "that is why all the rest are now a horror to her. That is what happens to those who pluck and eat fruits at the wrong time and in the wrong way. The fruit is good, but they loathe if ever after."

"Oh, I see," said Polly. "And I suppose because she took it in the wrong way it won't work for her. I mean it won't make her always young and all that?"

"Alas," said Aslan, shaking his head. "It will. Things always work according to their nature. She has won her heart's desire; she has unwearying strength and endless days like a goddess. But length of days with an evil heart is only length of misery and already she begins to know it. All get what they want; they do not always like it."

"I--I nearly ate one myself, Aslan," said Digory. "Would I--"

"You would, child," said Aslan. "For the fruit always work--it must work--but it does not work happily for any who pluck it at their own will. If any Narnia, unbidden, had stolen an apple and planted it here to protect Narnia, it would have protected Narnia. But it would have done so by making Narnia into another strong and cruel empire like Charn, not the kindly land I meant it to be. And the Witch tempted you to do another thing, my son, did she not?"

"Yes, Aslan. She wanted me to take an apple home to my Mother."

"Understand, then, that it would have healed her; but not to your joy or hers. The day would have come when both you and she would have looked back and said it would have been to die in that illness."

And Digory could say nothing, for tears choked him and he gave up all hopes of saving his Mother's life; but at the same time he knew that the Lion knew what would have happened, and that there might be things more terrible even than losing someone you love by death. But now Aslan was speaking again, almost in a whisper:

"That is what would have happened, child, with a stolen apple. It is not what will happen now. What I give you now will bring joy. It will not, in your world, give endless life, but it will heal. Go. Pluck her an apple from the Tree." 

So, upon hearing this, I wondered, "If Adam and Eve had not given into the serpent's temptation...do you think, in time, God would've let them partake of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?"

Because God knew Good and Evil. Knowing Good and Evil doesn't make one evil/bad/mischievous/suspicious.

Because Satan did tell a half-truth: they will be like God in knowing Good and Evil. They will be like God- as in, they themselves will be a pair of gods.

But just like how I can't be Amy or Susan or Avery or whoeverthehellIadmire I can only be me. I can aspire to be like God who is kind, and gentle and all-knowing, but yeah-. I can't be Amy or Susan or Avery. I can admire what they do and do what they do in my own way, but I will never be them.

And then I wonder...what would it have been like to know about Evil without being tempted to do Evil.





I have also been in the middle of reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.

Now, mind you, I've just started this little food-kick of mine so my opinions on food production and sustainability; etc. are, well, dim, compared to bright-white light bulbs-opinions. So, feel free to correct me if I'm 'wrong' or something not-right.

Anyway, anyway, Ms. Kingsolver is on neither side when talking about large food companies like Monsanto, or those golden arches, but I have wondered... I understand you use real food- you just reshape it into something familiar and friendly coast to coast. Yeah, I know you get your potatoes from real potato farmers.

I understand that the preservatives you put in your food aren't too harmful.

And, I do eat at your restaurants. I am hardly one to deny someone treating me, or a quick french-fry-impulse-fulfillment. But...that's a lot of only one kind of potato.  And with the mass production of all that one-kind-of-potato, how's the soil doing?

But, are you only telling me half the truth?

I have no idea what the other half of that truth is, but what does that matter? I'm already receiving this half of the truth- I think it's enough to know it's a half-truth to be upset I'm not worth the whole-truth.

I don't mind the convenience of food because just like I would read for hours on end, I would love to spend hours cooking, perfecting that crockpot of mac & cheese but other things need to be done, like paying bills. I just-. Don't arm me with tools that only do a slightly good job, but put all the money in your pockets.

Ordering from the dollar menu will just help me put my money toward diabetes medicine.





And then I came across the 'Whiteness Project'.

Race is sticky. Stickier than bathing in honey, but like the picture above ^^

I am so glad you think all humans are equal, but did it ever occur to you that the majority of people don't think that? I am more than thankful that if/when you come across me you won't ask if I speak English well, but by denying that people do actually ask me that you are diminishing the problems I do face; the problems I wish I didn't face. You, oddly, become one of those problems.

"That doesn't happen to you. That shouldn't happen to you."

"Thank you. I know."

Are you doing anything to help it not-happen to me? 

And I am different. People are different. Cultures, and geographies, and food--all very different. 

It's not that I want to be treated differently; I don't wish to be different, not in that sense. I just want to be a human being, color-blind and stuff, but I can't. 

And because I can't I have to do something about it. 

I wish you didn't feel guilty for being white, but maybe now you can know what it's like to feel guilty for being not-white. 

And what is so wrong with feeling guilty, anyway?

Maybe it's just me, guilt is when you understand how hurting people feel--really, the people you hurt, consciously or unconsciously. When someone doesn't feel guilt that does not immediately imply innocence, just a lack of understanding. A lack of empathy or sympathy. A lack of justice. 

We are all fed a half-truth, suggesting that race and culture don't matter because they are all the same because we are all human. But that is not true at all. I think all these problems started because we tried to treat too many different people in the same way. 

I know lynching is illegal now, but lynching wasn't the only form of racism. If anything, racism today is far more passive aggressive and personal, as opposed to physical. But passive aggressive racism doesn't make the news. Ferguson does. So when we talk about Ferguson most people don't understand how something as extreme as this could happen because they don't know the millions of passive aggressive actions that took place beforehand.

I know stuff like that shouldn't happen, but knowing doesn't stop things from happening. 

And as for fulfilling racial quotas, do you think people of an obvious race appreciate only being hired for their skin color, so that it looks like the said company isn't racist? No, no. 

These are half-truths. We're all talking about the bandage without acknowledging the deep, bleeding wound the bandage is trying to heal. 

I'll be honest. I didn't need 'The Whiteness Project' to tell me how white people feel. I know how you feel. Everything you said is everything I have felt. You may feel colorless, like the chair in the room that's always been there, but that's not so different from feeling colored and the new chair in the room. 

People are people: everyone will always feel abused in one way or another, but your inability to empathize with how I am abused does not make me any less abused. 

from my journal, 21 August 2014:

"Now that I am aware of my hoity-toity-judgmentally-female-dog Christianity I can work on it and be a real little Christ. So, that’s exciting. (I wish I could introduce you to everyone I’ve met.)

...Presently, I cannot decide if my experience in the office has been a blessing or a ‘curse’ (as much as any curse a young, middle-class, first-world Asian American would experience) because I find that I am always in the unique position of viewing both (sometimes all) sides. That sounds arrogant—it sounds as though I’m implying I empathize with all sides. I am not implying that; I am saying rather that I am consistently put into situations that challenge my original perspective. I do not seem to be allowed to keep my first impressions. I am doomed to speculate over my first impressions, attempting to maintain a second, third, and fourth.

They (whoever ‘they’ really are) did not lie when they said, ‘The help know everything.’ “Why, Justine, do the help know everything?” “BECAUSE YOU DON’T BLEEPIN’ PAY ATTENTION TO THE HELP THAT’S WHY! AT THAT POINT WE ARE WALLS WITH ELECTRIC SOCKETS THAT YOU USE TO RECHARGE YOUR FIRST IMPRESSIONS.”

First impressions?

Yes, first impressions, because I have been wondering a lot lately about ignorance and ‘revelation’ (so to speak for lack of a better word) and I have concluded, or at least came up with this awesome sentence: “My lack of experience [in racism and/or prejudice] does not diminish the experience of tens, hundreds, thousands, millions.”

I have been protected most of my life to have experience little amounts of racism and prejudice: most racial comments directed at me are, “Oh! I thought you were younger. It’s because you’re Asian. Asian people are eternally youthful.” “You look so exotic.” “I didn’t think you could be from the Philippines; your English is too good for that.”

And if I age- if, when I’m thirty I start wrinkling- am I not really Asian?

‘Exotic’ is a word used to describe foods and atmospheres: I am of neither category.

I think you meant to say, ‘You speak English too well to be directly from the Philippines.’ Although, for the record, I have cousins born and raised in the Philippines who speak English without ‘an accent’. So. There."

Away (circa 2012)

I looked to my left and right, tempted to turn around although I know that I should not, so I hold onto my father’s hand tighter, my palms sweaty from anxiousness; the heat couldn’t have affected me for it wasn’t hot outside. The weather felt a perfect spring. As my father and I kept walking tears passed from my eyes to my face, both happy and sad; both with impatience and with patience. Finally, my father tugged at my arm, causing me to look up into his smiling face. He did nothing to wipe away my tears, merely watched every one that fell. His eyes asked, What are you thinking? I laughed uneasily and slightly embarrassed. He tugged at my arm again, so gently, that perhaps he wasn’t tugging at my arm at all, just swaying his arm as we walk.

My mouth opened of its own accord and I said, half asking, “I think I like that young man.” At this point, both my hands were wrapped around my father’s arm, expecting something to be said or done but not sure what. My entire body read ‘expectation’ although my mind could not read the words.

My father smiled. “I know. He is a very good young man.”

“Yes,” I agreed as quietly as I possibly could afraid that I would hear myself and agree more than I should. I blushed and giggled. “Yes. He is.” I repeated. I wanted to ask fifty three more questions that all revolved around my left hand but I said nothing, knowing that my mind already gives away much.

“You want to know if you will see him again.”

I nod my head shamelessly and skip ahead so that my father would not see me blush. “I know we’re walking away from him,” I called back as I began to walk backwards. “So I suppose that means I am not his; he is not mine-. But that makes me think of Lewis’ illustration of the cliff and the town*…but I also want you to know, Papa, that if you are leading me away-away I know that I must be okay with that. I just- well, I don’t know, Papa. I’m just talking, wishing and praying.”

He kissed the top of my head and placed my hand in the crook of his right arm. “I am leading you where you need to go.”

“Yes” I said, my childlikeness overpowering my adulthood. “I should just wait and see then, huh?”

He abruptly pulled me into a bear hug, lifting me off my feet and scaring me because of it. I punched him though nothing I could do would hurt him.

“You must also do! You must also do!” he screamed this in my ear, but I shoved him away, playfully irritated.

“What must I do, Papa?”

“What I ask.” He laughed, an excited look on his face; he pulled me to run with him. “Come,” he said. “This way! Are you ready for your next adventure?!”





*I'll find the direct quotation for you soon!

your turn

if you sat right across from me
i would have nothing to say to you
not because i have nothing to say;
but because it is your turn to speak.

you'll never meet a listener quite like me.

poor aim

i know i dodged a bullet

but then that means you dodged a bullet, too.

i do not want to be a bullet.

i want to be the target you missed. 

Commentary

Once I invited my best friend and her brother to come to church with me. Someone or other had told me that to invite friends to church is a good deed done unto everyone, and God. So, I invited them because I wanted to do a good deed. And, you know, she's my best friend, I want her to be a part of my life in that way. 

My family and I picked them up. They walked down their front steps and I thought, "They are too dressed up." I mean, I'm all about Sunday best, I guess, but I was only in fifth or sixth grade--I knew nothing about women's suits for preteens and that's what my friend wore. Her brother wore something similar. They were matching. They're not twins, but for a second I thought they were.

Church was church. I barely remember what went on. I remember I decided to sit in the third row, and I remember my best friend's brother kept asking when we were going to eat because he's hungry. I shrugged. 

Then we had communion. And my best friend's brother was like, "YES! FOOD!"

But it was only one small cup of grape juice, and one teeny tiny piece of matza bread. He downed both as though he'd never eaten and asked me, "Can I have more?" 

I did my best not to laugh. 

Then one of them dropped a book. 

I don't remember being embarrassed, but my parents were. My parents, before church began, asked, "Are you sure you want to sit in the third row? So close to the front?"

"Duh, we always sit there."

I think about the way people act in church. Then about the way people act outside of church. 

Sometimes in public places children will throw embarrassing fits- well, the children are fine, it's the parents who are embarrassed (well done, kid). And most onlookers will mumble, "Get your kid under control." or "What bad parents." or "That kid needs to be spanked." or "That kid is spoiled." 

Such unnecessary commentary. 

Sometimes in public places people trip over nothing. Onlookers will laugh and/or tease. Perhaps trip over nothing, too, cheeks burning red, eyes looking everywhere but passersby. 

Then behavior in church...

I am church kid, but I'm not a church kid. Let me put it this way: I did not grow up knowing 'Jesus' as the right answer to everything. I was unfamiliar with how to act in public situations, and though adults perceived me to be a quiet kid my parents knew otherwise. 

I laughed very loudly. 

I spoke loudly. 

I made faces loudly. 

I was just loud. 

I inspired many passersby and onlookers to comment on or about me. I inspire commentary. Some might say I deserve commentary. I mean, somebody's got'a tell me I'm doing something wrong. Yeah. Right. 

Today is the first Sunday of the month- most churches have communion on the first Sunday of the month. 

Another fun fact, I've been attending this church consistently for a couple months now--super new for me. (Note: this church is different from the one I mentioned above.) When I visit a new church I tend to be very skeptical. Not like, "Oh, is this church going to convince me to believe in God. Again?!" I am just skeptical by nature; analytical and jaded. I am really jaded. I am amazed at how jaded I am.

Today I partook of communion and reflected on the past communions in which I did not partake. I wondered why I didn't partake. 

In one church I visited several times over an extended period, the church had its congregation come up to one of two tables where rested the cups of juice and plates of bread. I did not partake because I was a visitor, and didn't want to stand in line with people I assumed would look at me funny. 

Augh.

Some communions in which I did not partake I hadn't spent enough time reflecting on my sins. Even though I was told ahead of time we'd have communion the following week, I didn't spend the following week reflecting on my sins. And I knew that to partake of communion with an impure heart would doubly damn me.

Right? 

Well, however I thought way back when, I missed the point of communion. 

Whatever communion means to you, it doesn't just mean the elements of the Last Supper. It's not just the bread and the wine. Nope. Now, I'm no linguist, but I don't think it's a coincidence that word 'communion' and 'community' have the same beginning 'com'- with; a sharing (dictionary.com). 

Whatever communion is to you, it is not taken in solitude. It is taken with others. And as much as any community relies on individuals, individuals too preoccupied with their role in the community are likely to overlook actually acting out that role. 

I am not saying that my not partaking in communion disrupted others, but I did prevent myself from, you know, communing. 

I was so worried with what an onlooker or passerby would think instead of reflecting upon what the elements of bread and wine represent. Worried I didn't spend enough time in self-loathing...I mean reflection.

I partook communion today more thankful for Christ's death and resurrection than I was worried about people's perception of me even if I tripped over myself, don't appear to be able to raise kids, dropped a book on the floor of a silent auditorium full of people, or asked if more juice and crackers were coming round. 

If a stranger's commentary shouldn't matter that much to me, how much less should the lies I tell myself matter? (So much less.)

Trust me, I am all about growth and criticism, but seriously, neither of those should ever encompass the God who made commentary and tripping over nothing possible. That's probably why I've never thought 'Jesus' was the right answer. It felt too broad, and no one ever cared to explain the details of that breadth. 'Jesus' is not the equivalent of 'abracadabra'.