communion
Struck by this again today: https://hazelgabe.wordpress.com/2017/03/29/what-if-we-wanted-bridging-youth-leaders-to-continue-their-work/
I'm not a UUer (been to a few services, not quite my thing) but I think I just figured out why I've felt so uncomfortable going to church as an adult. I like singing and listening to sermons and praying together well enough... but as soon as that postlude starts, I can't wait to hit the door and have to really steel myself to go downstairs and put in an appearance at coffee hour. And it just hit me that it's not the church service I'm trying to get away from - it's coffee hour itself.
It feels so aggressively performative - everyone putting on their fancy grownup clothes and their fancy grownup faces and presenting themselves as being as "normal" as possible. You eat a small amount of food, not enough to satisfy actual hunger, but just to have something to do with your hands as you awkwardly mill around the room, making meaningless chit-chat, trying to package your life into sound bites that are as easily digestible and devoid of substance as the snacks you're holding.
People ask how you're doing, and "lost and alone and terrified" doesn't feel like an appropriate answer, because you're not really interested in explaining yourself to a room full of people, and because it feels rude to interrupt little old Mrs. Ganarello's pleasant weekly ritual with a record scratch like that. Illness, injury, and death are more acceptable topics of conversation here than in the culture at large, but only as described within certain narrow parameters, to be responded to with somber nods and murmurs and platitudes; actual individual suffering and empathy are not in the program.
But she means well, after all, and doesn't seem to understand why phrases like "Keep your chin up!" and "God won't give you more than you can handle!" might be hurtful, and you didn't come here for an argument and everyone means so ****ing well that you just want to scream.
I don't know the answer. It seems like smaller groups are better, and I know some churches focus on small-group ministries for that reason, but I can't tell you why youth group or even Sunday School in a class with 20+ kids still felt like a safer and more genuine space. It's the reason I didn't like big parties even when I was doing better, and it's the reason some people give for avoiding social media: the pressure to present an inauthentic version of ourselves, saying much but revealing nothing.
I'm not a UUer (been to a few services, not quite my thing) but I think I just figured out why I've felt so uncomfortable going to church as an adult. I like singing and listening to sermons and praying together well enough... but as soon as that postlude starts, I can't wait to hit the door and have to really steel myself to go downstairs and put in an appearance at coffee hour. And it just hit me that it's not the church service I'm trying to get away from - it's coffee hour itself.
It feels so aggressively performative - everyone putting on their fancy grownup clothes and their fancy grownup faces and presenting themselves as being as "normal" as possible. You eat a small amount of food, not enough to satisfy actual hunger, but just to have something to do with your hands as you awkwardly mill around the room, making meaningless chit-chat, trying to package your life into sound bites that are as easily digestible and devoid of substance as the snacks you're holding.
People ask how you're doing, and "lost and alone and terrified" doesn't feel like an appropriate answer, because you're not really interested in explaining yourself to a room full of people, and because it feels rude to interrupt little old Mrs. Ganarello's pleasant weekly ritual with a record scratch like that. Illness, injury, and death are more acceptable topics of conversation here than in the culture at large, but only as described within certain narrow parameters, to be responded to with somber nods and murmurs and platitudes; actual individual suffering and empathy are not in the program.
But she means well, after all, and doesn't seem to understand why phrases like "Keep your chin up!" and "God won't give you more than you can handle!" might be hurtful, and you didn't come here for an argument and everyone means so ****ing well that you just want to scream.
I don't know the answer. It seems like smaller groups are better, and I know some churches focus on small-group ministries for that reason, but I can't tell you why youth group or even Sunday School in a class with 20+ kids still felt like a safer and more genuine space. It's the reason I didn't like big parties even when I was doing better, and it's the reason some people give for avoiding social media: the pressure to present an inauthentic version of ourselves, saying much but revealing nothing.