Author:  Kirstin McCarthy

My father was once a Catholic priest. We are not Catholic. He attends Zen Buddhist retreats in Providence, Massachusetts and New York. He walks with Tich Nhat Hanh. We are not Buddhist. We say Hebrew prayers over Thanksgiving dinner. We are not Jewish. I went to a Quaker high school and for four years attended Quaker meeting weekly. I am not Quaker, though I do consider myself a seeker, perhaps in a different sense.

As I have wandered through life, my early faith community was a Lutheran church in my hometown. I have been touched and shaped deeply by this community. My mother (who was a member of the Swedish Covenant Church) and my father (who continued to practice as a Catholic after he left the priesthood) both dropped their religious affiliations in search of a faith community close to home when I was born. What they found was a young, vibrant and welcoming church called Emmanuel Lutheran. It was a source of invaluable strength for me during my youth.

Faith for me has been, more than anything, the community that I find at church. Church community members support one another, share some common ground, and some differences, and most importantly, they carry each other in times of need. I think “carrying each other” is particularly important to me.

My mother died when I was 10 of a disease called ALS- Lou Gherig’s disease. The congregation at Emmanuel played an invaluable role in supporting my family during my mom’s illness. Visitors made it possible for her never to leave our home for a hospital. In her longest days, our pastor and other members of the community were in our home around the clock. This is a community that I know has seen me at my worst. And they love me still. I can’t tell you how much they carried me.

I struggle with this faith as well. While I believe unalterably in the goodness of the community I’ve found there, I am often troubled by the aspects of Christianity I can’t understand. I find that I sing hymns always, but I do not speak the creeds.

I don’t know what I believe about Jesus, or God, or disciples, or the Bible. God is wrathful and God has unconditional love. How can it be both? Why has that God of unconditional love, who provided such support for my family in our time of need, forsaken our gay friends, who want to be married in this same community? Where is God’s unconditional love for them? In the bible God protected Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego from the fires. Why didn’t he protect my mother from the pain and suffering of her illness?  Moses “parted” a sea. How exactly did he do that? While I recognize the understanding that these stories are mythic metaphors rather than scientific realities, sometimes I fail to find, or disagree with their representative meaning. A big question for me has always been, why in the world did Jesus have to die for our sins?  I’m baffled by how that solved anything.

For me, these questions are vital. I believe there must be more there than what meets the eye, because the “halleluiah moments” I have known in my life have been so awesome. And, I don’t ultimately question why disease stole my mother from me because those life events have made me exactly who I am. I believe strongly that there is a powerful life force that I want to know more intimately. The reminder, every Sunday morning, that I should keep pushing to understand that, and that others too want to understand it too, is vital.

With each question that I ask myself about God, Christianity and organized religion in general, I find I uncover a deeper understanding of myself, and ultimately, my faith. A quote from the letters of Rainer Maria Rilke embodies what faith and spirituality are to me.

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart

And try to love the questions themselves…

Don’t search for the answers,

Which could not be given to you now,

Because you would not be able to live them.

And the point is, to live everything,

Live the questions now.

Perhaps then, someday far in the future,

You will gradually, without even noticing it,

Live your way into the answer.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

For me, the crux is not at all living my way, “into the answer”, but to, “live the questions now.” Living those questions, and pushing myself to explore them deeply, and in community with others, is a wildly exciting notion to me.

image by Dom Dada (rights)

This article is part of an ongoing series called “Young Adult Voices.” This series gives young adults who are either in congregations or searching for a congregation a voice to express their cares and frustrations about the Church. Because many of these young adults are trying to find  places of welcome in Washington area ELCA congregations, the articles are anonymous.

As a single mid-20′s young adult in Washington, my life consists of any number of things:  from taking steps to advance and begin my career, to keeping up with friends from college who are spread all over the country, to working on a social life here in DC- my time, and especially the time on the weekends, seems to bleed away before I know it.  And, as a single mid-20′s Christian young adult-this has created an interesting dynamic in my faith life.

I consider my faith to be an extremely important part of my life, but with life the way it is for me right now, I might not always be able to attend Sunday morning services with the regularity that I did as a youth growing up, or that an older generation might find more “normal.”  The reasons why are numerous; being out of town, having visitors in town, work commitments and, yes, if I’m being honest, sometimes just being lazy (among a variety of others), -but the key is that just because I might not always be at church doesn’t mean that I don’t consider having a faith community to be important-on the contrary, I consider it extremely important.

A shared community of believers is something wonderful, and while relationships and friends provide some of that community in my life, I nonetheless feel connected to the congregation I attend here in town, even though I’m not always there on Sunday mornings.  And the way I feel connected is through the other opportunities that are available to partake of the church community:  the young adult activities at night, the service opportunities, and the personal relationship that I’m working on creating.  But even more significantly, I feel more connected to that congregation when that community has actively reached out to me and made me feel that I’m wanted.

Its those times when I have been at church, or other events, and people have approached me about coming to coffee hour after the service or attending a young adult’s event that I’ve really felt connected to that community.  And even more specifically, its not just those times when someone simply mentioned it to me, but when someone has taken the affirmative steps to facilitate me being a part of that community – whether its been a simple offer to grab coffee after the service together or to meet up at an event happening later in the week – its been those times when someone has taken the extra step that I’ve felt the most connected.  And those efforts, little though they may seem at the time, are the reason I want to make this church community a bigger part of my life, the reason why I’ll continue to attend church activities, and reason why I’m starting to feel more at home and a part of that place-even though I might not always be around on Sunday mornings.

image by PHOTO.WORKS (rights)

This article is part of an ongoing series called “Young Adult Voices.” This series gives young adults who are either in congregations or searching for a congregation a voice to express their cares and frustrations about the Church. Because many of these young adults are trying to find  places of welcome in Washington area ELCA congregations, the articles are anonymous.

For a city that should be a model to the rest of our nation, DC’s got a long way to go.  I’ve been a resident here for a year and a half now, and it didn’t take me long to realize that our schools suck, our roads suck, cost of living sucks, traffic sucks, our hospitals suck, and parking is horrendous.  I made the big mistake of bringing a car to DC in April.  I didn’t particularly want to have it, but because of a family emergency, I needed to borrow my mom’s car, just for a few months.  I never knew a cute speedy Jetta could be such a huge stressor, but as I searched through parking options and stood in line at the DMV for hours, I quickly learned that DC is not on my side.

I am 23.  In the next 10 years, it is likely that I will go to grad school, get married, settle into a career path, buy my first house, and maybe even have a kid or few (not necessarily in that order)!  How is it that all of those other pieces are supposed to fall into place when I can’t even find a place to park my car??!  Forgive me for being a bit dramatic, but there are days when I’m quite sure I’ll never achieve anything off that intimidating list.  And on my most dramatic days, I feel completely alone in the struggle.

Towards the end of college, I met regularly with a career counselor from Luther’s Career Center – Mark.  I joked with him that I’d like him to be my career counselor for life, but seriously! – who is supposed to help me now?  My challenges seem bigger and my questions more in depth as my understanding of the world both grows and diminishes at the same time.  Where is Mark now?  And can he help me find a place to park my car??

This is where the church is presented with an opportunity and often fails (according to me).  While churches are slowly gaining wisdom about creating and energizing Young Adult groups, they must not forget the power of intergenerational relationships.  We need each other.  I need my peers so we can commiserate together about being 23 and completely lost.  And I need the older adults in the church who have gone before me…who have successfully made it through their 20s and live to tell about it!

One of the most vocationally helpful exercises I’ve been through came from the Quaker tradition.  At a recent Volunteers Exploring Vocation retreat (put on by the Fund for Theological Education), I participated in a Quaker Clearness Committee.  Clearness Committees are designed to help an individual wrestle with an issue through listening and asking questions.  About six people sat in a circle around me that day.  I presented my issue – should I apply for grad school in the fall or keep working?  And for the next hour, they were only allowed to ask questions and welcome silence.  I did not walk away from that experience with a yes or no answer.  But somehow, I left feeling freer and more well-equipped to choose my path.

In the Quaker tradition, a Clearness Committee would meet with you again and again until you feel as though your issue is resolved.  It’s this sense of community that I feel has been lacking from my church experience.  Not the chatty, nosy community – there’s plenty of that in the Lutheran church!  (It’s clear to me that people are curious what I’ll do next.)  What I find less frequently are genuine listening ears who treat my struggles as their own.  Who seek to ask questions rather than offering answers that worked for them when they were my age.

I ended up having to rent a parking spot for $120 a month.  Less than ideal, but at least it’s taken care of.  And I decided not to go to grad school right away.  Yet somehow, life keeps happening, whether I’m ready for it or not.  Still, I am convinced that we do not have to be alone on this journey!  I invite you to come with me – for the journey is long, and we weren’t created to walk this road alone.

image by JaseMan (rights)

This article is part of an ongoing series called “Young Adult Voices.” This series gives young adults who are either in congregations or searching for a congregation a voice to express their cares and frustrations about the Church. Because many of these young adults are trying to find  places of welcome in Washington area ELCA congregations, the articles are anonymous.

I recently visited a friend of mine from college in Philadelphia.  He’s been there for two years, having moved from the Midwest to attend graduate school.  While we walked the streets of his neighborhood and caught up, he confided in me that he was lonely.

My friend is smart, successful, and generous.  He’s interesting and outgoing.  But here he was, sharing that he’s lonely in a city of millions of people.  He said he didn’t connect with the people in his program.  His new job is at a small firm without many people his age.  His closest friend in the city is a girl he used to date, and while they still get along well, she is seeing someone else these days.

I’ll bet my friend’s story is common.  Even in this media-soaked, interconnected culture, many young adults still are looking for connection and community.  And they aren’t always sure where to find it.

Thinking about my friend’s story made me think about my own social life over the ten years since college.  The place I’ve primarily sought community is church, and I’ve always been fortunate to find it.  But the first thing I’ve looked for in a church hasn’t been the name on the door – it’s been the quality of community inside.

I’ve worshipped for lengths of time at a charismatic church that had people speaking in tongues and running the aisles, and I’ve attended a church so conservative that they didn’t use instruments or permit women to pray during the service.  I went to each – not because of denomination and certainly not because of doctrine – but because I found peers and community (and in one case, a girl).

And I didn’t find the Lutheran church I currently attend because it’s Lutheran.  I participate in this church because friends I respect attended there, so I followed.  And once inside, I found that my gifts and participation have been valued, and I am surrounded by committed, connected people who share my passion for social justice.

While my friend and I walked and talked, he also mentioned he’s giving online dating a try.  He’s not content with the bar scene, and he hasn’t met many quality eligible women through work or school, so he’s turned online to meet new people.

At this point, some might be wondering why I didn’t suggest that my friend find a good church, since that’s been where I’ve found such rewarding relationships (and even a few eligible bachelorettes).  But there’s a catch – he’s not a Christian.

I’m honestly not sure what it would take to get him to darken the door of a church, but I know that most traditional churches wouldn’t present much appeal.  Raised in a devout Christian home, he gave up his faith in college after a truly genuine struggle with doubt.  If he were even willing to visit a church, he’d need a place that understands doubt and where hard questions can be asked without receiving easy, Sunday school answers.

As someone who works for a real estate company that develops affordable housing for low-income renters, my friend would probably need a church that connected with his values of service and activism.  And as a music junkie and amateur musician himself, he’d probably look for a place that could offer a worship experience of depth and sincerity – even if the quality isn’t always the best – that went beyond worn out hymns and cheesy praise choruses.

And given my friend’s bout with loneliness and struggle to meet eligible women, it probably wouldn’t hurt if the church he visited had single people his age.  It’s a reality that young, single people attract young, single people, whether at the local watering hole or the local church.  Most unchurched, single 30-somethings I know aren’t ready to trade their leisurely Sunday morning brunches and New York Times browsing for a church service with a room of people double their age.

I hope my friend can find good community, and I’d be thrilled if it were through a church.  I wish he lived in DC so he could visit mine.  However, I’m honestly not very confident that – even if he were actually interested in darkening a church door – he’d have much luck walking into a local church of whatever denomination and finding much of what I list above.  But here’s hoping.

image by Gret@Lorenz è una combattente! (rights)

“Perceptions” What young adults think about the Church, Christianity and Christ. A project comissioned by the National Lutheran Home & Village at Rockville, alongside the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Metropolitan-Washington, D.C. Synod.

This article is part of an ongoing series called “Young Adult Voices.”  This series gives young adults who are either in congregations or searching for a congregation a voice to express their cares and frustrations about the Church. Because many of these young adults are trying to find  places of welcome in Washington area ELCA congregations, the articles are anonymous. This article’s picture reference to “Spirit Garage” is taken from the church to which this author refers.

Growing up in Minnesota I often struggled with my relationship with church and God. My mother grew up Lutheran and father attended a small rural Christian church in his youth. My parents always had good intentions taking my sisters and me to church on a regular basis, getting involved in Sunday school, vacation bible study, and various church productions, but my attachment to church and relationship with God was always wary at best.

When it was time to apply to college I seemed to have briefly turned a blind eye to my target schools’ religious affiliation or lack there of. I ultimately found myself at a small Catholic liberal arts University in the Midwest. It was there in my required theology courses that I began to form my relationship with God, but still, not directly with the church.

A few years after graduating from college I began to date an amazing woman who is now my wife. She was my spiritual opposite. Having a strong Lutheran upbringing and describing herself as a church basement lady in training she said that in order to continue to date her we would need to find a church to attend, together. Knowing this was the woman for me and after some heart to heart conversations I obliged and we found a church that fit both our needs. The church was a plant by a well-established Lutheran congregation looking to attract unchurched young adults, they described themselves as “Lutheran under the hood”. It was casual enough for the cautious, curious and scared newcomer, yet traditional Lutheran (in a way) for my spouse. Its location in an urban environment with a large young, single population made the church perfect fit. With equal parts rock and roll and multimedia coolness there was no question we were at home. The church and its community was a blessing on our relationship as we participated in numerous small groups, helped prepare the space for worship, and served on the stewardship committee and was our home for a number of years.

In the fall of 2008 we relocated for work to the D.C. metro area. Sad to leave our family, friends and church we were still excited for a new adventure. One of the early items on the to do list was to find a church, but where to start? We both spent time talking with local connections for suggestions as well as searching online, because everything is online, right? Wrong. Years ago I used to bet people that I could find anything online in under 5 minutes. Give me a question and I was off to hunt it down, but this time, my search engine skills were failing me.

If I had only searched for “church my city Maryland” I would have received no ELCA matches on the first page, which could mean up to 10-14 weeks of visiting churches before we would have gotten to a Lutheran church. Luckily we knew better and used a combination of the ELCA online directory, at the suggestion of my wife, and more specific online search, but even then I could tell quickly that the particular churches I found weren’t for me, I was looking for a website that I could relate to as a 20 something newcomer to the area.  A website that told me all about the congregation in only a few pages, and an extra bonus if there was a cool multimedia section of the site so I could hear their great band and experience the church without ever showing up on a Sunday morning. I wanted to know that I would fit in and have small groups and activities that were suited to my non traditional church relationship. My search engine skills did fail but after I had almost given up hope, I heard a news story on the radio of a new kind of church in the area that sounded just like what I was looking for. I got to my office and did a quick search for it online and there it was, a relatively new church, meeting in a movie theater, that really seemed to understand young adults, with small groups, great contemporary music and with a great vibe to their website which was the first and only impression I had of their church. We ultimately made plans to attend a service, but never made it, it turned out that it was almost an hour drive from our home and in our attempt to get there we got lost and never made it back.

We became frustrated and ultimately stopped looking, believing that what we were looking for did not exist. In my heart I remain hopeful and do believe that with time I will find my home.

This article is part of an ongoing series called “Young Adult Voices.” This series gives young adults who are either in congregations or searching for a congregation a voice to express their cares and frustrations about the Church. Because many of these young adults are trying to find  places of welcome in Washington area ELCA congregations, the articles are anonymous.

I’m a 33-year-old single professional woman.  It’s a given, I like to shop.  But my most recent shopping challenge has had nothing to do with a great pair of shoes.  I am shopping for a church.  A Lutheran church to be specific.  And I’m about to give up the search because of what I’ve found so far.

Let me be clear. .  I consider my role as Christ’s disciple to be the defining one in my life.  I’m not a C and E Lutheran.  Oh, no.  My tattoo design is Martin Luther’s Rose.  I’m pretty intense in my love for Lutheran doctrine.  I was baptized at Bethany Lutheran Church in Erie, PA, raised in Nativity Lutheran Church in Allison Park, PA, and confirmed just a few miles from there at Berkeley Hills Lutheran Church.  I was a member at BHLC until I moved here to Northern Virginia three and half years ago.  That’s when my shopping trip began.

I started as I think most people would, at the Lutheran church closest my home.  It was a lovely parish.  But three weeks into my tenure there, I realized I had heard every single sermon before.  Now, for someone who believes preaching should be approached with a Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other, as do most media-infused young adults, this was a problem.  I was, however, willing to stick it out and see if things changed because this church had something that I needed, an evening service.  I travel a great deal for business and am often not home on Sunday mornings, so this was a great fit.  But about six weeks after joining the church, I got a form letter saying the service had been canceled due to lack of interest.  Funny, the 20 or so of us who came every week were interested.  We’re all of course aware of the budget reality of keeping a facility open for an extra night, but why weren’t the people who attended asked for their needs, opinions, thoughts on alternatives, etc.?  Young adults don’t expect the church to have all of the answers, but they expect to be engaged in two-way conversation to get to an answer.  But the deal breaker in my relationship with this church was the young adult ministry.  More to the point, the fact that the senior pastor gave the stewardship of the program to an intern since the church “couldn’t sacrifice full-time staff to something that was largely social.”  (Note: I found it patronizing that what to me was a need for Biblical community was seen as no more than social hour).

So on to the next church I went.  This time, it was to a Christian mega church that hosted a service geared toward young adults.  It had almost everything I wanted.  Sermons that related to real life and current events, great worship music, relaxed atmosphere, an evening service, small groups, and tons of service opportunities.  I stayed at this church for about a year.  What made me leave this young adult mecca?  It wasn’t a Lutheran church.  At the end of the day, I couldn’t swallow the inerrancy of the Bible, no matter how great the marketing.  (Note:  Marketing is not an evil word.  One of the big reasons mega churches siphon off the young adult population from traditional churches is that they embrace marketing.  To quote churchmarketingsucks.com, “We love the church, but it needs some help. Typos, cheesy logos, and bad clip art aren’t helping the cause. But snazzy marketing won’t save this ship, either. It’s not about being perfect, but there’s a better way to communicate. It’s authentic, it’s loving, and it knows how to spell.”)

The next stop on my shopping trip was dictated strictly by the availability of an evening service.  But proving that lightening does indeed strike twice, the service was canceled because of lack of interest about two months after I joined.  I emailed the pastor with my frustrations at the cancellation (ie: You can’t treat a new initiative with the Field of Dreams attitude, if you build it they will come.  A new service aimed at bringing in young adults requires marketing to young adults where they are and having a “product” that appeals to them.).  So the pastor challenged me to stay, get involved, make this traditional church a more hospitable place for young adult community.  I dove in headfirst: participated in the social ministry, attended some of the women’s brunches, tried to organize a blood drive, decorated the church for Easter, served on a call committee, and volunteered for council.  But after all that what I realized was that this congregation (and I am beginning to wonder if this is not all Lutherans in general) values tradition and the familiar over evolution and inclusion.  Unfortunately, I felt as if my ideas were only wanted when they were in line with the others’. When they weren’t, I wasn’t heard.

In the end this experience has reminded me of something my father told me was his greatest joy as a parent, to give me roots and wings.  I am searching for a church that will do the same, give me comfort and strength in my Lutheran roots, and help me test my spiritual wings during these transformative young adult years of my life.

image by CasaDeQueso (rights)