Let
Me In
A
member of my congregation in Glasgow was going on a trip recently and, on the
way to her flight, popped into a little store to pick up a few souvenirs to
take to her hosts. She spotted the flag of Scotland—a white X on a field of blue—decorating
a fridge magnet which had inscribed on it: Let Me In—Size Doesn’t Matter. She went
to take several only to realize they weren’t fridge magnets but packages of
condoms. (She chose boxes of fudge instead.)
“Let
me in—Size doesn’t matter” screams to be on a church sign. Rather than the
generic “Visitors Welcome” or the often untruthful “All are welcome.” A church
near us erected a board on two stilts to display an exhaustive list of events for
each day of the week; it’s also an exhausting list as Saturday is the only day
of rest for this congregation. Across the top of the board, in large letters,
it purports, “ALL WELCOME.” So far I’ve resisted the temptation to spray-paint
what I know to be the actual practice of that church’s minister: “as long as
you are a baptized Christian, heterosexual, not cohabiting, not divorced, and
with no children born out of wedlock.” Perhaps they could add a weekly class
for “Born Again Virgins.”
I
grew up in the land of church signs. One that pricked my teenage feminist
consciousness said, “There’s never been a perfect woman and there’s only been
one perfect man.” If that sign hadn’t been so high up on the side of the
building, it might have gotten lit one night by a training bra in flames.
One
church sign, here in Glasgow, stays with me—not the sign as printed but the
graffiti scrawled over it: Where the hell is God? Every time I pass by it I
feel hopeful knowing the psalmist is alive and well and doing her job, crying
out with honesty and directness. Who knows, she could be a baptized Christian
who went to that minister seeking to have her newborn child baptized only to be
told no because she wasn’t married. She might have bought the can of spray
paint from someone who lives with his partner. Maybe the divorced city employee
assigned to clean off that graffiti resonates with the sentiment and thus allows
it to remain. I wonder does the church get the message?
No comments:
Post a Comment