![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amidthestarsI've spent the last half-hour sitting very quietly on my couch, watching the sky get dark. It is a rare evening where the solitude in this little apartment feels friendly, and kind - rather than painful, or threatening, which is more often the case. The sky is almost completely black now. I've been thinking about things.
This morning I went to my dear Anglican cathedral where, for the first time, I filled out my donation envelope with my name and address and checked off the "I am a new parishioner" box. Until now, I've been leaving all the information blank. It's a small gesture, and in practical terms it really just means they can send me a tax receipt at the end of the year, but it feels decisive - claiming this parish as mine. As opposed to a place that I sort of tentatively visit, where I kind of skulk in the back pews and cry and try not to make eye contact with anyone (I learned quickly that the Anglicans really love to introduce themselves to you, which is awkward when you're weeping.) For a long time, I wasn't ready for that. (I counted today; I've been attending Anglican services for almost 6 months.) But I'm ready now.
It's so strange, all of this. I look forward to my Sundays at the Cathedral, and on the nights that they have Evensong, oh boy. I wake up floating. As uneasy as I sometimes am about their forwardness, people are kind. They introduce themselves, welcome me, learn my name. I'm not used to it, but I like it. Today they announced that one of their female deacons was about to be ordained and my whole being just sort of heaved in gratitude to simply be in a place where that happens.
When I first came back to the city, I joined a choir based out of my Catholic parish. This past Holy Week, we combined forces with a local Lutheran parish on Good Friday: we joined them to sing at their service, and then they joined us to sing at ours. The Lutheran parish was run by two female pastors. The liturgy was different than what I was used to, but to see a church lead by women was... something I still don't have the words for. When the main celebrant read the Gospel, I wept. When she preached, I wept harder. My poor choir-mates were quite concerned.
I hadn't known how badly I needed to see that until I saw it. I had not understood how deeply that was missing from my life until I experienced it. Intellectually, I knew: it's shitty that women can't be priests but that's just how Catholicism is, they have their reasons, I may not like them but what do I know, Lord to whom shall we go, etc. But experiencing it changed everything. I left that service (in a blizzard, with snowflakes as large and soft as torn tissue) knowing that I needed to seek more of it, of what I had just seen. That I couldn't un-know that service, that Gospel, that sermon, or my absurd pile of tears in the face of them. That what I had known until that moment would never look the same, or feel the same, or be the same.
What I know - what I feel - is that I cannot be myself in the context of Catholicism. I tried. I tried so hard. I was all in, and it nearly killed me, and that is not hyperbole. A few months ago, that wouldn't have felt like a good enough reason. But, in some weird surge of courage, several months ago I talked to the Anglican chaplain at the university where I work. He asked, "Is there a part of your sense of vocation that you feel you can't live out fully in the Catholic Church, or that you think you could live more fully in the Anglican context?" I don't know about vocation - these days I feel a little skeptical of those in general - but I do know that I cannot be me. Nor can I fully express my love for other people, or God's love as I have come to know it. That seems valid to me. Several months ago, I would have said that if I felt I couldn't be myself that's because "myself" is wrong, but I am very slowly beginning to understand that that perspective is eight thousand kinds of crap.
And when all of that fails, what I tell myself is that, from the very beginning, my decisions were never about finding a place where I could be comfortable, or where I could find "answers." This has always been about being able to ask bigger and bigger questions. I had assumed that the monastery was the place of the biggest questions. I assumed wrong.
This morning I went to my dear Anglican cathedral where, for the first time, I filled out my donation envelope with my name and address and checked off the "I am a new parishioner" box. Until now, I've been leaving all the information blank. It's a small gesture, and in practical terms it really just means they can send me a tax receipt at the end of the year, but it feels decisive - claiming this parish as mine. As opposed to a place that I sort of tentatively visit, where I kind of skulk in the back pews and cry and try not to make eye contact with anyone (I learned quickly that the Anglicans really love to introduce themselves to you, which is awkward when you're weeping.) For a long time, I wasn't ready for that. (I counted today; I've been attending Anglican services for almost 6 months.) But I'm ready now.
It's so strange, all of this. I look forward to my Sundays at the Cathedral, and on the nights that they have Evensong, oh boy. I wake up floating. As uneasy as I sometimes am about their forwardness, people are kind. They introduce themselves, welcome me, learn my name. I'm not used to it, but I like it. Today they announced that one of their female deacons was about to be ordained and my whole being just sort of heaved in gratitude to simply be in a place where that happens.
When I first came back to the city, I joined a choir based out of my Catholic parish. This past Holy Week, we combined forces with a local Lutheran parish on Good Friday: we joined them to sing at their service, and then they joined us to sing at ours. The Lutheran parish was run by two female pastors. The liturgy was different than what I was used to, but to see a church lead by women was... something I still don't have the words for. When the main celebrant read the Gospel, I wept. When she preached, I wept harder. My poor choir-mates were quite concerned.
I hadn't known how badly I needed to see that until I saw it. I had not understood how deeply that was missing from my life until I experienced it. Intellectually, I knew: it's shitty that women can't be priests but that's just how Catholicism is, they have their reasons, I may not like them but what do I know, Lord to whom shall we go, etc. But experiencing it changed everything. I left that service (in a blizzard, with snowflakes as large and soft as torn tissue) knowing that I needed to seek more of it, of what I had just seen. That I couldn't un-know that service, that Gospel, that sermon, or my absurd pile of tears in the face of them. That what I had known until that moment would never look the same, or feel the same, or be the same.
What I know - what I feel - is that I cannot be myself in the context of Catholicism. I tried. I tried so hard. I was all in, and it nearly killed me, and that is not hyperbole. A few months ago, that wouldn't have felt like a good enough reason. But, in some weird surge of courage, several months ago I talked to the Anglican chaplain at the university where I work. He asked, "Is there a part of your sense of vocation that you feel you can't live out fully in the Catholic Church, or that you think you could live more fully in the Anglican context?" I don't know about vocation - these days I feel a little skeptical of those in general - but I do know that I cannot be me. Nor can I fully express my love for other people, or God's love as I have come to know it. That seems valid to me. Several months ago, I would have said that if I felt I couldn't be myself that's because "myself" is wrong, but I am very slowly beginning to understand that that perspective is eight thousand kinds of crap.
And when all of that fails, what I tell myself is that, from the very beginning, my decisions were never about finding a place where I could be comfortable, or where I could find "answers." This has always been about being able to ask bigger and bigger questions. I had assumed that the monastery was the place of the biggest questions. I assumed wrong.
no subject
Date: 2017-08-22 10:53 am (UTC)And I'll tell you what else. Though I'm not invested in the church (and tend to give them a pass on a lot of things bc "they have their reasons," etc), I'm starting to really feel how not ok all this is. It started when you got here last summer, but the feeling is growing. Organised religion leans so heavily on acceptance of tradition, I can see why they're slow to change. But the idea, when the church itself is waning, they'd hold those who are truly committed at arm's length (or stifle any of those voices) isn't just backwards, it's self sabotage. And for what?
You are teaching me some things, my Anglican friend. ☺