The Lord's Late Breakfast

Today I cast my shadow, for the first time in almost a year, over the doors of a Protestant church.

Some months ago, a Notre Dame grad student named Sarah googled "i hate south bend" and found my blog. We struck up a correspondence about how South Bend is a difficult area, and how fed up and discouraged we've been with the church scene across the board. Yesterday I met her, her husband, and their two-year-old son at the Chicory Cafe, and we had (or at least I had) a great time, sick toddler notwithstanding. The told me they've been attending a Methodist church on the South Side that's pretty good -- with a congregation that believes in sharing itself with the surrounding community. At their invitation, I decided to attend.

It came at a good time: I had set a December 3 deadline for finding some church to attend, at least for the Advent season, because last year I slept through church for the entirety of December and felt not at all spiritually prepared for Christmas. It sucked. So this morning I rolled out of bed, drank my coffee and dressed -- a little nervously! -- and went to church.

It's tiny. Fifty people max. I hadn't attended a Methodist church before, but at least they're Arminian (har!), and this one is liturgical. With which, having gone the Catholic way for awhile, I was comfortably familiar -- and the extremely user-friendly bulletin helped further, even letting you know which word to use in the Lord's Prayer ("debts"). Two of my favorite Advent hymns ("O Come O Come Emmanuel" and "Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus") opened the service, the sermon wasn't bad, and the congregation were engaged with each other and friendly. A lot of people came up to me during the Passing of the Peace and after the service to introduce themselves, shake my hand, and ask what I do and how long I'd been in South Bend. During the announcements at the end of the service, they asked if I wanted to be introduced, so I stood up and Sarah introduced me, saying, "I met her because I read her blog." Everyone laughed.

But I liked Communion best. It's done every week at this church, and people go up in waves to kneel near the altar. The reverend went around and tore off a hunk of homemade whole wheat bread and placed it into each person's outstretched hands. She bent over each person as she did this and said, "So-and-so, this is the body of Christ broken for you." I knelt with folded hands and wondered what she'd say when she got to me, since I was new (and I hadn't yet been introduced to the congregation). She came to me and said, "Sarah, this is the body of Christ broken for you."

She'd taken the trouble to learn my name. Incredible. At the last Protestant church I attended, I shook the pastor's hand at the door at the end of my third month of attendance, and he asked me if I was a first-time visitor. (That ended my church attendance until my brief exploration of Catholicism this fall.)

The highlight of Communion was that the size of my chunk of bread about equalled the size of my fist. After dipping it in the wine, I stared at it for a second, thinking, Well, Body of Christ, what do I do with you? Do I nibble on you? Or do I cram you in my mouth all at once? I opted for the latter because it was kind of crumbly, so while the woman next to me picked at it shred by shred, I forced my lips to close around the huge bulge in my cheek and chewed as discreetly as possible, staring embarrassed at the floor and thinking I looked like a four-year-old chowing down on the Host. I was really hungry though, having not had time to make breakfast before bustling out of the house. The whole experience left me oddly joyful.

Oh, and my next door neighbors attend this church as well. Weird. There are about forty thousand churches in the South Bend area; that's not something one might ordinarily expect.

So now I have a church to attend, at least for awhile, and new friends to sit with. (And eat lunch with afterward!) The people seem warm and involved in each other's lives. Maybe the small size will suit me best.

What's happening to me? Is this a growing up thing? Where finding The Perfect Church isn't as important as attending a decent one? Where weighing disgust with the contemporary Church and the responsibility to participate in the Body somewhere tips the scales toward responsibility?

Probably. Whatever it is, it's kind of great. I feel hugely relieved. Problem solved (for now).