I got reminded of something important today. For a long time we've had less butts in the pews on Sunday morning than we need. Less butts in the pews than need us. We had a guy come in from the diocese today to talk about congregational development and he explained to us how important the first five minutes after someone walks in the building are... and it occurred to me that I am not friendly and outgoing. Oh, I can fake it. I fake it fairly well when I need to. If I'm approached or want to approach someone it's no problem, but on Sunday morning I can turn into a icicle pretty quickly.
I come in late these days and sneak out after getting out of my choir robe. I've become socially isolated from our community. You know that awkward moment when you realize you're not Christianity's target market for congregational development? Yeah, I had that today. I'm not what they're looking for. I'm not married, I don't have kids, the only time my family comes with me is when I guilt them into it by telling them a Jew and a Hindu are coming to Midnight Mass and they're not. I'm not a 'young family with children'. That's not me.
I have noticed, however, that they do notice when I don't show up. I blame this largely on the fact that I am very loud and make up 1/3 of our soprano section. I do prayers, I host coffee hour, I read from the lectern. I participate. The one thing I seem to be lacking lately is love. Love in the sense that I need to be willing to step up and socialize with people even when I have a shopping trip to get out of the way, I need to say hello to people I don't know and impose myself on them more often, and let's face it, I could less of a clam up when it comes to passing the peace.
I suck at that stuff. I'm going to work at it. For my St. Matthew's people I'm going to ask that you accept this change in me and realize that it isn't easy for this Awkward Annie to pretend she doesn't want shirk away and hide in her cave after church.
I'm going to ask the rest of us to do something I'm actually good at: Show up. Come to church. Participate. Hang out. For God's sake, someone join the choir. I mean that literally. Please. Join the choir. Actually, showing up and breathing the same air as the rest of us on a regular basis would go a long way. I know we're all tired and nervous and very busy but this is important. Dean Kevin (who I am told we are forbidden to call Dean Martin, but it's funny so I say we do it anyway) explained our worship service as performance we put on for God as opposed to being a show God puts on for us. I don't believe for a minute that God needs our worship, but I do believe we need to offer it to God to maintain that life sustaining connection to our spirituality and each other. We have something beautiful going on here, and we need to fully engage in it.
I really do love you guys. Even on the days I want to crawl back in my cave and not talk to people any more.
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