In which I re-hash some old stuff about going to church

I have some things I want to talk about but I feel the need to do some set up first. So there are several things in this post, which will seem unrelated at the moment, but eventually maybe it will make sense.

First is informational: I think people who are not religious sometimes don't realize that there is wide variation in the political and social beliefs of people who call themselves Christian. There are, of course, the conservative Christians who try to reserve the use of the term "Christian" for themselves, and who are very publicly anti-LGBTQ, anti-abortion, and pro-virginity (for unmarried women). They also often oppose the ordination of women (i.e., women cannot be pastors in their churches, and in some versions, women are not allowed to even lead worship or pray from the pulpit).

Although that group of people think that they alone are "Christian," there are actually millions of people who honor the life and teachings of Jesus Christ but who don't share that set of prejudices. I was raised to be one of those conservative Christians, and I didn't realize that Christians could be any other way until I was in college and started visiting some other, different churches. That simple realization, which was mind-boggling to me at the time, felt like the truth that had set me free. It was one of the best things that's ever happened to me.

Dean and I have attended the same church in our small Montana town since we moved here in 1992. At the time, the congregation was fairly large for the size of our town (300-ish members), and there were regularly well over a hundred people in worship services.

If you've been around for awhile, you may remember that although we attended church sort-of regularly (1-2 times/month), I didn't join for a long time. Dean joined shortly after we moved here, but I was still feeling ambivalent about church, and although this particular church had many of the things I wanted in a church family (other kids the same age as ours, friendly atmosphere, active in the community, and allowed women to be pastors), it didn't have certain others--most obviously, it discriminated against the LGBTQ community by not allowing them to be elders, deacons, or pastors. (Same-sex marriage wasn't even a discussion in 1992.)

So I attended without joining, and if you want to read more about that, I wrote a post about it in 2011. But that ambivalence was maybe even more important. In 1992, I had only very recently been able to disentangle myself from my evangelical upbringing, and I just wasn't interested in tying myself to another church of any type. Church still filled a need for me, a need for ritual and acknowledgement of a Divine Being, and I loved (and still love) the community of people at our church. But I couldn't really agree with a lot of the things you had to say you agreed with if you joined, so I didn't. Join, I mean.

Ack, I could keep going on about this for paragraphs but it's not necessary for where I'm going with this. Long story short: At some point in there, I read Kathleen Norris's book Amazing Grace, which helped with my ambivalence about the church's creeds. And then our denomination approved gay ordination in 2011, and shortly thereafter I officially joined the church I'd been attending for 18 years. And then in 2014-15, our denomination changed the language of the Book of Order to allow pastors to perform same-sex weddings, and I was even happier.

On both of those occasions, we lost a sizeable number of members of our church. And then of course people left for other reasons, and new people came, and babies were born and people died. So now our church has about 180 members, and we've been through a lot.

And if you read all the way through this post, you've been through a lot, too. I will try to make it worth your while when I get around to part two, which probably won't be until next week.

7ToF: Dooooo Yooooour Ears Hang Low, do they wobble to and fro?

Can you tie them in a knot, can you tie them in a bow?

It's possible I spent too many years at camp.

1. This is a No-Shame Zone (NSZ) for people with weirdly shaped ear canals. I can't possibly be the only person that can't keep earbuds in their ears, can I? I look at people wearing $200 airpods and think, well, that would be $200 down the drain for me. I'd lose them in twenty minutes. Maybe five.

2. But you know-- bluetooth listening is pretty appealing. I like listening to audiobooks and podcasts while I'm doing stuff around the house, and it's a lot simpler with something I can wear rather than something I have to carry around from room to room. So, as long as I'm not being too active, these work (they're wired to each other, but not to my phone). The rubber inserts keep them in my ears in a way those slick airpods can't match (and they're one-tenth the price, too). The link is to Amazon, which I know some of you don't like, but the only other place I can find them is on eBay.

(For the record, I am not an Amazon affiliate, I've never had the patience to sit down and figure out how to set it up. In other words, I don't make any money when you click on a link in my blog.)

3. Let's talk about Amazon. The more I find out about their business practices, the more disturbed I am about supporting them. But on the other hand, I can't tell you what an amazing resource Amazon has been for someone who loves to read but lives in a town without a bookstore (I've talked about this before, here). When my kids were little, and Amazon only sold books (remember way back when?), it was a miracle for me to be able to get online, scroll through a practically infinite number of books, and have what almost felt like a conversation about books by scrolling through reviews.

4. But I get it. Amazon is changing retail on a global level, often in ways that are destroying other legitimate businesses. I stopped buying anything from Amazon that I could get locally over a year ago, and I check our library website first for Kindle books. I do my best to support independent bookstores whenever I can (including the snobs at the bookstore in the town to our north, and the used bookstore here in our town, neither of which ever seems to have the books I want).

5. TV report: I've watched a few Dr. Who episodes over the years, but I've never really qualified as a Whovian. But we caught the pilot of the new series last fall, with Jodie Whittaker as the first female Doctor, and really liked it. So I set our DVR to record any Dr. Who episode it could find, and we now have over 140 episodes to watch. We're slowly working our way through them and becoming bigger fans with every one. I need a Tardis.

6. I went to Texas last week for my mom's 83rd birthday and my older sister's 60th birthday. I'm only two years younger than my sister, so 60 is definitely on my horizon. I can't say I'm exactly happy about it, but I don't think it will bother me as much as 50 did. If you've been around for awhile, you lived through that with me so I don't think we need to go there again. Anyway. The trip was fun and it was nice to be out of winter for a few days. It wasn't exactly tropical down there but there was no snow and the sun came out enough times to make me happy.

7. One midlife topic we haven't discussed much around here is caring for aging parents, and it's because I haven't had to do much of it. My dad passed away in 2011, well-cared for by his wife. My mom still lives independently, and although I can tell she's slowing down a bit, she's still sharp enough to be writing books. She's getting ready to self-publish her fourth novel. She's amazing. But she's not very mobile. She can still walk short distances, but she uses a cane. And I think she's in a lot more pain than she lets on. The last morning I was there, I asked her what hurt the most, since I know she's had trouble with her ankles, knees, and hips. She paused a minute, and then sort of laughed a little and said, "Well, you know, really I'm just kind of miserable." I'm a little self-conscious when I'm with her to be able to stride along, moving fast, walking and walking and walking with no conscious effort.

So our moment of gratitude for this week is for walking. If you can still walk with ease, don't take it for granted. Enjoy every minute.

Have a great weekend. It's good to be back, although I'm not promising to post regularly.