I was not a Hallmark movie kind of new mom. No obsessive nursery decorating, no mother-daughter dresses, no series of portraits declaring “I’m (this many) months old today!” You have to remember, I missed my own infant losing her umbilical cord due to my time in the special hospital. (If you’re new here, by “special hospital” I mean “psychiatric ward”.) A lot of the showier, frillier parts of new motherhood were lost on me. I was a lace up your sneakers, strap in your baby and go kind of mom. As we strollered our way in endless circles around town, we kept passing a sign outside a little stone church that said, “All are welcome here. That means ALL.” 

The first time I saw the sign, I probably smirked at it. The church-sized chip on my shoulder that I’d grown up with was still alive and well. For months, I eyeballed the sign suspiciously, sometimes glancing over my shoulder once we’d passed it like it was some sinister dude following me on the subway. I KNEW that not everyone was welcome at church, and one of those unwelcome people was me. But something in me wondered if the people behind this sign actually meant it. Until on Easter Sunday, without admitting to myself what I was doing, I dressed my baby in a white smocked dress and tiny silver bracelet. Then, instead of pushing past the sign, I folder up the stroller and walked on in. 

Me and Jesus like to make a show of it. I mean, seriously – the day of his resurrection party was the day of my return! I dressed myself semi-appropriately for the occasion, wearing one of my nicer tops, but it wasn’t until after the service on the playground when I realized I was literally wearing my fish-out-of-water-ness on my sleeve. The playground was flooded with women from the bigger, more traditional church service across the street, women who were wearing Lily Pulitzer with perfectly matched lipstick and jewelry. I looked for an entry to the Lilys’ conversation, but they seemed to know each other already and offered me minimal responses. 

Baby and I sat and watched the bigger kids play, and one of the nursery workers offered us a goodie bag. She was too little for the plastic toys and candy inside, but still – a sign of welcome. I remember the earnest face of the female minister in the little stone church and the rocking chairs in the back where we could sit and the array of outfits around the church, no one looking anywhere near as intimidatingly pulled together as the lipsticked Lilys. Maybe there was space here for us. 

We showed back up the next week. Which might have been the day that the minister, the Reverend Katy, taught us a call and response that she had made up.

KATY: This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!

CONGREGATION: Yay!

From there, Katy would launch into a sermon, taking the ancient texts and somehow finding pieces of revelation, inspiration and even feminism all over the Bible verses, pieces that I completely missed every time I’d tried to pick up the book itself and give it a read. Over the weeks and months ahead, my little one went from cuddling in rocking chair with me to crawling around the back of the sanctuary. She crawled up the aisle one day and almost made it to Katy while she spoke (Katy afterward: “That was awesome!”) It WAS awesome, and the awesomest thing of all was, we belonged. Elaine, Bernard, Beth, the other Come As You Are or CAYA regulars – no matter what else was going on in our Monday to Saturday lives, we walked or strolled or stumbled in every Sunday, listening to Katy mine truth from the Bible and watching the sweet children in our midst grow up together. 

I started going to my current church several years ago when they offered a NAMI training for the community. (Well played, Jesus. Nabbing me through the mental health angle once again.) A few weeks ago my current minister Patrick delivered a sermon on the time Jesus was starving for 40 days and nonetheless told the devil where to go (aka, Matthew 4:1-11). When I try reading stuff like this on my own, it feels like a dark fairy tale with a little soap opera thrown in. But to hear Patrick muse on them, these verses are about the power of identity. People live their labels, the things we believe we truly are. Jesus was all about living out God’s will, and he wasn’t about to break that. There was more great stuff too, about not categorizing, and not judging, and what it means to live as the people of God. THIS IS WHAT I NEED, PEOPLE. Progressive ministers to translate the ancient verses so that they stick the landing in my mind. I need a weekly ritual, and reminder that my teeny little corner of the world that can feel like such an overwhelming swirl is part of something much, much bigger. 

Okay, here’s the part where I do what I once thought was a creepy thing that I swear is not meant to be a creepy thing – you are welcome to check it out here. If you’re in the ATL and want to come over some Sunday, that’s cool too. It’s the kind of church where you can come once a year or once a week or once, ever, and it’s all good.  The church leaders might not love me phrasing it that way, but what I’m trying to say is – all children of God are welcome. Which means everyone. Which means you.

I need a weekly time to be in this kind of community where kindness, welcoming and grace are the rules of engagement, and a weekly reminder to treat everyone like the beloved children of God that they are, which is not necessarily easy when little irritations keep going off in my life like firecrackers and people out there keep unintentionally tap-dancing on my trigger points. God compliments me daily on my patience with these people and my godliness in not biting off their unenlightened heads. KIDDING, I am so completely kidding on that last sentence. After all, as the fabulous Anne Lamott reminds us, if you think God dislikes all the same people you do, you’re doing it wrong.