That Church Saga Continues

After mostly taking the summer off from church, I was there yesterday. The boys were singing. The senior bishop was visiting. I was ambivalent to begin with, now even more so.

The bishop(s) has been getting more involved - which is mostly good, I guess.

For a bishop visit, it was not a spectacular turnout. There were whole pews empty. The combined choirs were down about about a third.

Before the service began, the bishop talked about how wonderful it was to meet with a group of newcomers to the parish before the service (even amid the tumult, there are a handful of new families). He said he's be around to mingle for a short bit after the service, but then had some meetings with the staff in the early afternoon before attending to dicocesan duties.

The service started, and when it came to sermon time, the bishop said some interesting things. He wanted to thank us for always paying our diocesan assessment.

Then he went on talk about how living in a community is to be forgiving, constantly, and we all know what it means to live in a community, espeically our parish.

I was rather floored at all of it.

First, where were the meetings with the members of the parish who have started to drop away? Where is the outreach? Has the parish and diocesan heirarchy just given up and sees that group as a lost cause? In a time when the Episcopal church as a whole is losing members, should they be so cavalier about membership? The rector has yet to reach out to a single parish member that has fallen away, so I guess I can't expect the bishop to do so. Thing is, with all the people the rector has alienated and/or fired, he probably doesn't even know who is missing.

Second, we can't afford to pay our diocesan assesment this year. The church budget is very much in the red.

Third, while I agree with the discussion about forgiveness and the need to forgive, it leaves out the important other side: that those in the community must recignize that they are not perfect and in fact need forgiveness from others. The sermon was wholly one-sided in that respect.

None of us are perfect, and I've made plenty of mistakes in my life, and in this church saga. I've overstepped a couple of boundaries, pushed some people a little too far. But the other side of the church saga - the rector, R - has yet to admit to a single mistake in how he has done things in the last 15 months. He has yet to take any responsibility for the dwindling attendance. While the bishop wants me to forgive R, R doesn't even recognize that he needs any forgiveness. It was weird.

I talked with a woman afterward during coffee who is just coming to the realization that things are off, way off. I tried to be very careful in what I said to her, not to sway her one way or the other. She talked about how many people are missing, things like that. I had to be even more careful with my words when the rector's wife kept positioning herself near us (we'd move, she'd move, too). I suspect we'll we talking again soon.

I wanted to believe that I could somehow make a difference by speaking up, but I'm feeling more and more thwarted and pushed down and dismissed. It seems to me collars are doing everything they can to protect collars. It's the patriarchal structure at its strongest.

It's extremely disheartening.