I was thinking about rituals today, well, because I wrote about it, LOL. I try to post twice about each “prompt” but some of them are really hard because… they just are.
Last
week I was in a meeting and very uneasy.
I could barely hold it together, and honestly, I am not sure how well I
did. I really had to dig deep to find
out the real source of my contention, I also had do pray. I feel like sometimes the more I work on the
things, the more things there are to work on. Which is sometimes annoying, because
each one seems harder than the last.
One of
things I always do (once I CTFD) is to ask myself “what is causing me to fear?” And that answer does not always come
easy. But I can say that almost always
if I am “on 10” I am afraid of something.
Last
week the conversation was about leadership in our church. Which honestly, set me off. Not because anyone said anything aggressive
or inappropriate, the issue was because I attended a church for 8 years, and
for the 8 years I attended the church I witnessed, and experienced mental &
emotional abuse. I witnessed racism and
sexism. When there would be an issue,
and it was brought up, the Pastor would gaslight me and others. There was so much abuse in that church (and
it still goes on) I can’t even begin to list it all (nor do I want to). It starts at the pastor and bleeds into the
deacons and elders, it’s incestuous. I
have decided that I will not be quiet anymore about that church and it’s abuse,
because my silence is my concurrence that it is ok, and it is not! I won’t wave it like a flag on 4th
of July, but I will tell the truth when asked.
I’ve
learned to name my fear. I’ve learned to
ask myself “is my fear warranted?”. In the case last week, I had to ask myself
if I trusted our church staff and did I believe that God appointed this staff
and did I believe that they were people after God’s own heart. The answer to all those questions was “yes!”. The heart of those leading the discussion,
was to follow God’s leading.
I
believe in the Church, it’s got it’s issues, and there sure are plenty of them! But the Church is the Bride of Christ. God chose the Church to send out His love for
each person. The problem is that in
every dang church there are imperfect people (beginning with me!) and a lot of
those imperfect people are hurt. Hurt by
the world, their past, and even, dare I say it, the church.
The
ritual of asking myself “what is driving your fear?” has proven to be a driving
force in my healing. The only way I can heal
is to do the work, to pray, and to hold tight to God. And those are the best rituals I could ever
have in my life.
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