ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGS
July 20, 2025
Today, I leave on my final sabbatical trip. It will include checking on my father-in-law in Arkansas and hanging out with my siblings in Nebraska, but a majority of the time will be spent interviewing different pastors on how better to engage our first-time visitors. As I have shared with many, we have four different groups of people visiting CCCC. The first are people who come from a Disciples of Christ background or a similar denomination. That’s a group that already knows the basics and usually understands CCCC without a lot of explanation. The other three groups are where we find the challenge as they enter our space with dramatically different needs and questions.
The first of these three groups is the segment of the population with very little or no church background. For those of us who have been in church all or most of our lives, we are thoroughly church and often don’t know how to think and speak without all the Christian lingo. So often we don’t even realize we are speaking a foreign language.
The next group is made up of mostly marginalized people, often those who are in the LGBTQ+ community, and they have heard the narrative in many other churches about how they are not loved by God and must change before they are accepted. For them, even walking inside a church is a frightening experience, and though CCCC seems to say the right things on the church’s website, there is apprehension that it is a facade to lure them in for the purpose of changing them. Sadly, they’ve seen it before.
The last group is what is often referred to as the deconstructing. These are folks who have been fully immersed in a form of Christianity that uses strict binaries to define itself—Us vs Them; We are right and They are wrong; We are the saved and They are the damned. To hold this either/or system in place, these churches use fear, guilt, and shame very effectively and unscrupulously. These people in search of a different form of Christianity are finding such an approach to following Jesus as antithetical to the Jesus story, yet this judgmental and fear-based approach is often so engrained within them that they do not know where to begin anew.
As you can imagine, each one of these groups enters the doors of CCCC with different expectations, assumptions, anxieties, questions, and doubts. To have a preset three-step system for how we engage our visitors—a cookie-cutter approach—does not take into account the uniqueness of each individual’s story. Jesus didn’t take a cookie-cutter approach, except that many such engagements occurred around the table. Holy Grounds is a great starting place for us, though we cannot make the assumption that everyone will know what a “Holy Grounds” is. And there, around coffee and good food, an invitation to Sunday School cannot be made without first listening and getting to know a visitor. Maybe the person is highly anxious and sitting with a couple of people over coffee is risky enough. Or maybe the phrase “Sunday School” is meaningless and requires an explanation. Or maybe the visitor is really hoping someone will walk them into worship and sit with them.
We take a more nuanced approach, not because we want to grow our church and improve our budget. We take this nuanced approach because we deeply care about people and desire to Put Love First In All Things. We do not want visitors to ever feel as if they are a means to our end. Instead, we want them to feel valued and affirmed because we believe that is exactly what God believes and has called us to do. Of course, a nuanced approach is not exclusive for those who show up at CCCC on Sunday morning. I believe it is the approach we should take with every human being, no matter where the encounter occurs.
May you, Holy One, continue to encourage us to grow in our capacity to see the unique needs, questions, and yearnings of others. Help us to create a space where empathetic listening and love lead the way. Amen.
