my broken church

My Broken Church

I've been uncomfortable with Church for a long, long time, but it's only recently I've begun to see precisely why.

Now, I need to say straight away that I believe very strongly, and that this isn't about faith. (Admittedly my version of that belief will likely look different from yours, and that's a good thing. More on that later.) But Church never felt right (click here for the reason I don't call it The Church) and, despite my attempts to make it better for myself and others, it kept not working.

I wanted Church to work. I really did. I wanted to walk through life with that sense of certainty in Church's worth like my parents, friends, churchmates, and everyone else invested in it seemed to possess. I did all the Church things: sitting sore-assed in torture pews, took notes during sermons, sang the praise music, attended and ran bible studies, did and led youth group shenanigans, gave testimonies, made public declarations of faith, mumbled through countless prayer meetings, said all the things I was supposed to say (and a fuck-ton of things I wasn't), and on and on and on.

But although Church kept saying and doing the "right" things, it kept falling on its ass and letting everyone down. As it turns out, despite Pulpit saying otherwise, LGBTQS+ folk are not damned for being who they are; certain denominations/sects are not doing things worse than certain others; women who have abortions aren't blood-lusting baby killers; socialized communities and ideas aren't straight from Satan; people who swear and smoke weed and dance and drink alcohol are not less worthy of love or respect; women who lead aren't jeopardizing their holy futures; yoga and meditation and essential oils will not send you down damnation's slippery slope; and it's all right if you make plans and talk about the future without saying "Lord willing."

And it turns out that the "right" things are mostly fucking wrong. And the reason for that is simple: the vast majority of the things we do for Church are not getting done to love others as Christ intended, but merely to keep the institution going. We built what exists today, not God or Christ. Us. And we really hate letting go of the nice things we have, and so we keep building more and more stuff around what already exists so that we can keep getting more stuff to keep building more stuff.

Vatican City is the perfect metaphor for all of this, isn't it? Think about all that stone, precious artwork, sanctuaries for abusive priests, donation boxes, personal armies, and prime Rome real estate. What we want to believe is in the mystery and authority of the leadership and holy men (and yes, it's all men), all that incredible and desperate beauty, history, pageantry, and potential to unify the faith... but really all of those things exist to protect two things: power and money.

But make no mistake: it's not just Catholics. It's every church. Christ never said build megachurch arenas or march crusades against infidels or burn ancient libraries, either. He did say that if you believe, go out and serve people, and that love will help point them in the right direction. That's it.

And yet we broke the contract. Repeatedly. And then rewrote it, declaring that this version is the right one. Again and again and again. And kept building. And completely forgot about the people we're called to serve and love

The Breaking Church Project exists to recognize these shortcomings and call them out. Because there are scores of them, each as corrupt as prosperity televangelists and policies that separate migrant families. Will we find some solutions along the way? Maybe, but mostly we'll leave those to the people. Our job here is to speak plain and without forked tongues, and when something stinks, to point at the pile of excrement causing the stench, say what it is and why it smells so bad, then pour gasoline over it and light it up.

Why? The reason is simple: we're too important, and too cosmically loved to do otherwise, to ourselves and especially others. There are too many needy folks and unknown neighbours out there, and forgotten, saggy churches that will burn just fine.

Keywords: Broken Church; Faith; Deconstruction; Religion; Christian; Christianity; Church; Sin; Corruption; Scandal