Confirming Myself, Episcopalian

“…but being who we are in Jesus Christ, who Christ has called us to be. What it looks like to be an Episcopalian who walks in the footsteps of Jesus of Nazareth? Who loves like Jesus, who gives like Jesus, who forgives like Jesus, who does justice, loves mercy and walks humbly with God. Just like Jesus. We need some Episcopalians, no we need some Christians who look something like Jesus.“

-The Very Rt. Rev. Michael Curry

Two months ago I got Confirmed in The Episcopal Church. If you know even a little bit about me you would know that I have a very complicated relationship with The Church. In late 2020 during the pandemic and after trying many, many Churches over my life I had decided that I was done trying to find a Church that felt right for me and what I believed.

I knew I still believed in God, still believed in caring for all people, cared about feeding the hungry, clothing the unclothed, housing the unhoused, caring for all things created in God’s Image. I knew I still believed all these things, because how could I not? How could I believe that God created certain people with no worth on earth. 

When I think about what The Church should be and what people should associate with it I always turn to The Beatitudes in Matthew 5. Jesus is telling us about the people who are going to inherit The Kingdom of Heaven. He talks about those who are promoting peace, they will inherit. Those who hunger for righteousness, they will inherit. Then the last group of people who Jesus says are going to inherit The Kingdom are the people who are truly living out what we are called to do as Christians and are being persecuted and reviled by others who claim to be the church. 

It felt like every time I heard about the American Evangelical Church it was something totally different. It was people harassing others online for what they believed. It looked like Churches having exorbitant buildings and facades on their pulpits. It looked like pastors wearing $5,000 worth of clothing while preaching. It looked like adults who I was supposed to trust and who were supposed to help me grow my faith tell me I was going to hell because I was queer. It looked like pastors on stage praising Israel while they are actively bombing innocent Palestinians and withholding food and medical supplies. It looked like churches turning away the hungry family because they don’t fit the aesthetic of the church and might bring more people that look like that. It looked like the church only being pro-life until the baby is born and then leaving the parent and their child to starve. 

And it looks a lot like this:

“They should be sentenced with death. They should be lined up against the wall and shot in the back of the head” 

Hearing things like this is scary. It reminds me that the world exists outside my bubble. I have to be careful where I kiss someone out in public, I have to be careful where we hold hands. There are still people who want to line me up and shoot me in the back of the head. Re-read that. If that does not make you sick to your stomach, you are not a person I would feel safe around. 

And things like this were not a community I wanted to be associated with, at all. 

Then in 2023 I had a regular guest at the restaurant where I worked and she invited me to Church with her, at first I initially said no but after some convincing I decided to go and check out this Church. It was an Episcopal Church which I had never been to and was weary of it. On my first Sunday there something just felt right. I was confused by all the moving of the hands, the kneeling, the garbs that the clergy were wearing, High Church was something I had never experienced.

While confused by so many of the traditions that were going on I felt welcomed like I had never been welcomed in a Church before. I remember walking out of Church and looking back at it and I saw the engraving above the door “A House of Prayer for all People”. Seeing that was reassuring and made me want to try it again. 

And I did, each Sunday I went back I felt more called to the words that were being preached, the Priests were talking about issues that truly mattered in the world and how Christians should actually respond to them. This for me was something I had never seen in Church, growing up it always felt about what we needed to change about ourselves and others.

These are some of my favorite sermons I’ve heard so far:

“God is already loving these people ’cause God can. And so we get to join in the network. Sometimes that means loving people you don’t wanna love. Sometimes it is tough, it is inconvenient. Sometimes it is a joy and it is easy. But not always. 

-The Rev. Lucy Strandlund

“Maybe he was surprised to hear that this Messiah would heal gentiles and have long conversations with Roman Centurions. Maybe this Messiah wasn’t exactly the Messiah John expected him to be Maybe Jesus just surprised him. And if Jesus could surprise John the Baptist, who first met Jesus when he was still in the womb, who was born to spend every second of every day thinking about talking about pointing people to Jesus, then Jesus can surprise us too”

-The Rev. Erika Takacs

“It reminds us that each person is made in the image of God, and that when God came, God came not to be served, but to serve. It gives us practice in recognizing that neighbor means everyone. Everyone. And love is hard, but love always wins. It reminds us that justice comes before peace, It gives us practice in recognizing that neighbor means everyone. Everyone. And love is hard, but love always wins. “

-The Rt. Rev. Jennifer Brooke-Davidson

These three quotes come from priests that I heard at St. Pauls in Winston Salem, NC (highly recommend checking it out if you’re in Winston, the clergy and the parishioners there are phenomenal). Each of these sermons and so much of The Episcopal Church is about loving all others like Jesus. 

Reverend Lucy talks about how we get to join in with God while loving others, even those we find it hard to love, we get to be brave and join the Creator in love. Reverend Erika talks to us about Jesus’ cousin, John, who was born to be almost a Jesus spokesperson, how even Jesus surprised him with the radical acts he was doing and the people he was hanging out with. And then Bishop Jennifer reminds that all people are made in God’s image and that all people deserve love. She ends it by saying love is hard, but always wins. And that is so true and I even still need to be reminded of that every day, being Christian means loving people we find hard to love because love always wins and loving and serving the people who others would be surprised to see us serve. 

One last thing I want to mention and emphasize is the comfortability I felt when I asked questions or was curious about something. Feeling comfortable asking questions in Church is something that I never realized was going to be able to happen for me. But asking questions in The Episcopal Church was encouraged and helped create conversation and promote comfortability. I remember reading something about The Church of England aka The Anglican Communion which is the communion of The Episcopal Church was no longer going to allow same sex marriages in The Church. I got scared that this place that I finally found with a community I loved was going to be just another facade of acceptance. The comfortability of questioning that was promoted led me to ask two different priests about what I read. The first thing I was met with was an apology from the both of them, an apology that this is something I have to think about and worry about in my life, an apology that queer people have been pushed away and burned by so many churches. This was an amazing reaction, they were not upset I was questioning something, they were sympathizing with me for the pain I have experienced. 

I thank God for The Episcopal Church. I thank God for the Clergy who took time to answer the questions I had. I thank God for the person who invited me to The Episcopal Church. I thank God that I get to be on this earth and fulfill the call to love and serve all people.