Sunday in the Church with God

Well, this was quite the Sunday for me. A challenge, really, in ways that I wasn't anticipating.

It started when I realized fifteen minutes before the service that the person assigned to serve with me as a Eucharistic Minister had not arrived. Then the verger told me that the youth lector assigned to read the second lesson wasn't there. So, I volunteered that I would read both the lessons and lead the prayers for the people. I had prepared ahead of time, so I was ready.

OK, not really. I realized upon processing in that, ummm, I am doing all the readings? Yikes! It is a little known fact about me that I sometimes have waves of panic when I have to read out loud. It was really terrible early in my radio days. I would feel a shortness of breath right before I was about to go on the air, fearing that I would make a mistake in reading and not sound "professional". Weird, eh? Well, there it is.

I made it through the lesson from Nehemiah, and then waited as we sang Psalm 19. I closed my eyes and allowed the music and words to flow over me. The intrusive thought was that the next lesson was Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians... and it is long... and it has typical Pauline run-on sentences. But I had read it, I had written about it, I really liked it--so quit worrying! And then we reached the end of Psalm 19... and I joined in with the choir and congregation:

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.

Eureaka! I mean, seriously, Eureaka! I was centered. I was calm. And I felt that God had lifted the burden of perfection which pulls the focus off of God to allow me to do the thing I was there to do: share what the apostle wanted his audience in Corinth to hear which remains a real and vibrant message for us today!

Next came the prayers for the people. I included my friend Charlotte in the prayers because her illness has been weighing heavily on my mind since Friday. Our prayers are followed by the Confession of Sin, and a new weight rose to the surface. As I got to the lines about confessing that we have sinned against God in thought, word and deed...in things done and left undone... I was keenly aware that I needed to work out and acknowledge residual hurt I have been feeling around my friend.

She was my advisor in prep school, the person who taught me to trust, and the intervenor in my suicidal path. She was patient and kind with me when my behavior and attitude toward 'the world' was a bit like an abused dog. She helped me overcome a belief that God was out to get me and she was the one person in my tiny, cynical New England prep school who reached out to me to let me know that I did matter. So it is no surprise that I trusted her with the deepest secret I was keeping: my lesbian orientation. I couldn't say it to her. That would have required more guts than I had at that time. Instead, I hinted at it in my journal entries for her class... and then outed myself in my final paper. I thought she'd understand. I thought she'd accept me.

I thought wrong.

I eagerly went to pick up my paper at the beginning of my Junior year. I flipped to that section, read her words, and felt my knees buckle under me. I sat on the steps of the chapel, stunned and choking back tears. Her response was to tell me that my "sexual identity was still being worked out." Worse, she had already left the school for seminary, so I got my paper back from her successor. I wrote her a letter trying to understand why she had responded the way she did. She wrote back to me assuring me things were fine between us, but that she did think that I needed to read books with titles about "brokeness" and such because I had prematurely concluded that I was gay. I was numb, and this time it wasn't because of the anti-depressants I was taking to keep me from being suicidal. Good thing I was on the pills!

Almost a decade after that, I wrote her another letter and came out for keeps. This time, her response was more in line with what I had wanted as a teenager. She acknowledged that she had been wrong in how she had reacted before, and that she had grown quite a bit since that time. She didn't know if she "understood" homosexuality, but she felt there was much she didn't understand and it was all good. Apology accepted. I visited with her once in California, and again in North Carolina. And certainly my trip to see her 18 months ago felt relaxed and easy.

Still, I had a sense that there was something she wasn't telling me.

So, when I got her email last Friday, and learned of her breast cancer, I was shocked, troubled, and saddened. And as I looked over her website, and read more details that she hadn't initially shared, I learned that many changes had occurred in her life in 2009... including the start of a relationship with a woman named Betsy. And, much to my surprise, my reaction to this discovery was not that of a 41-year-old sister in Christ, but of a 16 year-old holding in the tears of rejection on the steps of Mosley Chapel.

Bizarre, and disturbing. There was still anger. And hurt. And now guilt because there was anger and hurt.

Why didn't she come out sooner? Why didn't she support me? Was she struggling with her own sexuality while stifiling mine?

And all the while, there is the understanding that every person must walk this path toward self-acceptance and coming out in their own way. There is the awareness that the church has not been the most open and affirming place for gay clergy, and in fact, some gay and lesbian people seek shelter in the church to either work on themselves, or find a way to avoid having to face their sexual orientation. I mean, if the rule is that UNmarried clergy must remain celibate, what a wonderful way to avoid yourself?!

I don't know what's true for Charlotte. But I knew in that moment during the Confession of Sin, that there are some deeds I have left undone for my 16 year-old Susan.

I sat in the chapel after the service with Mtr. Phoebe. The intent had been for me to receive an anointing on Charlotte's behalf, but I knew this was impossible as long as I had this pain present in my heart. To be fully there, in spirit, for my friend means for me to let go of all ego. And to get there, my 16 year-old clearly needs a say and a moment to be heard. Gestalt therapy has taught me never to ignore this part of myself!

All of me needs acknowledgment and forgiveness... for me and for Charlotte... because my friend is in a difficult place. Thanks be to God that she does have a partner who can be with her at this trying time. And thanks be to God for granting me the wisdom to know what I must do to be whole in my friendship, and liberal in my compassion for Charlotte.

Isn't it wonderful when God meets you in a church?