Interview Me!

I dis­cov­ered a new “Inter­view Meme” and decided it would be a great way to get acquainted with some other bloggers.

Here’s how it works: One blog­ger poses five inter­view ques­tions to another blog­ger who then pub­lishes the answers in a post link­ing back to the questioner’s blog.

Folks who want to par­tic­i­pate leave a com­ment say­ing, “Inter­view me!” and the per­son who was inter­viewed asks those folks five ques­tions to which they post their answers, along with a link back to the blog­ger who inter­viewed them … and so on!

Amy is “becom­ing the woman [she] always dreamed about being.” She man­ages the web depart­ment for a major weight loss com­pany and main­tains a lovely blog, What­ever I Feel Like. She lives in Penn­syl­va­nia with her hus­band, Rob, and sons Con­nor Austin and Aric Angelo. She says she loves “life, my fam­ily, my job, my friends and the Inter­net (ha!).”

So here is Amy’s inter­view of me:

1. Why are you seek­ing spir­i­tual enlight­en­ment out­side of the con­fines of the insti­tu­tional church?

In my very first post, Wel­come, I explained the events that inspired me to begin this blog. At that time, I was feel­ing very burnt out, hav­ing spent my entire life involved in orga­nized reli­gion, serv­ing the church in var­i­ous capac­i­ties. But those endeav­ors left me feel­ing cold, unin­spired and won­der­ing why, even though I did all the things I was taught to do, I just didn’t feel ful­filled by them in any tan­gi­ble way.

For a long period of time I wanted to leave the church, but felt unable to do so for var­i­ous rea­sons: Fear I would miss it, guilt about not feel­ing ful­filled by my activ­i­ties, habit, social con­nec­tions, my upbring­ing in which reli­gion played a major role … then the Holy Spirit showed me that I had no choice but to leave and forced me to con­front real­ity: When it comes to the insti­tu­tional church, I am a square peg try­ing to squeeze into a round hole. That truth is mag­ni­fied when con­sid­ered within the con­text of not only the com­mu­nity in which I live, but also the denom­i­na­tion to which I belonged.

The church is a patri­ar­chal insti­tu­tion that forces peo­ple into com­pli­ance through scare tac­tics, intim­i­da­tion, guilt, and busy-work. A huge per­cent­age of what goes on in the church has noth­ing to do with the rea­sons it allegedly exists — it’s a social out­let more than a place of wor­ship and reflec­tion. Pot luck din­ners, crab feeds, bingo or bunco nights, rum­mage sales, book sales, Easter egg dying par­ties … mean­while, the pas­tors never, ever inquired about the sta­tus of my faith and there was no Bible study for me to attend.

I believe in rad­i­cal inclu­sive­ness and the inher­ent equal­ity of all per­sons irre­spec­tive of their immutable char­ac­ter­is­tics. I could no longer be part of an insti­tu­tion that refuses to acknowl­edge or live by those prin­ci­ples. A few years ago, the denom­i­na­tion to which I belonged pre­pared course mate­ri­als and directed all local con­gre­ga­tions to teach a class explor­ing ordi­na­tion regard­less of sex­ual ori­en­ta­tion and same-sex mar­riage. The mod­ule was nei­ther fair nor bal­anced and, worse, the pre­sen­ta­tion in my local con­gre­ga­tion was hor­ri­bly one-sided. As I sat in a room full of Cau­casian, middle-class, mar­ried het­ero­sex­u­als and lis­tened to them spew hate speech, con­demn­ing other per­sons with­out even giv­ing them the ben­e­fit of hear­ing their voices or try­ing to under­stand their per­spec­tives, I knew that I should go … but it took me so long to exit that I am now embar­rassed by my own hes­i­ta­tion. And when I did finally leave, there were some mem­bers of that con­gre­ga­tion who still clucked their tongues in dis­gust when­ever they encoun­tered me and shunned me around the cof­fee pot because of the opin­ions and beliefs I voiced in that classroom.

Ulti­mately, the pas­tor proved him­self to be a per­son I could nei­ther respect nor be asso­ci­ated with, but he was just a tool used by the Holy Spirit which knows just how stub­born I am. It had to get me out of there because, among other things, my health was suf­fer­ing as a result of the stress of my mem­ber­ship and ser­vice. The Holy Spirit knew that it would take some­thing dras­tic to actu­ally get me mov­ing onto the next phase of my life, so it used the pas­tor. He was the cat­a­lyst; his rep­re­hen­si­ble con­duct was the prover­bial “last straw”. But because my dis­sat­is­fac­tion had been fer­ment­ing for so long, his lies and manip­u­la­tions were really minor when viewed in the over­all con­text of the situation.

I have no plans to get involved with another church. I don’t say “never” because we all know how that can turn out! But phrases like “a cold day … ” come to mind. As noted above, I just don’t fit. And I have no patience for either the non-spiritually-directed social non­sense or the sense of moral supe­ri­or­ity and assured­ness that char­ac­ter­ized my for­mer church.

I am quite con­tent to wor­ship in my own way and time, and my faith has grown and matured expo­nen­tially just in the three-plus months that I have been free from the chains of orga­nized reli­gion. That fact makes me very excited about the future, and eager to con­tinue walk­ing, unen­cum­bered, my own spir­i­tual path. I am hap­pier than I can ever remem­ber being!

2. What are some of your favorite blog­ging memories/moments?

Well, I’ve only been doing it for three months, but what I really enjoy is what I’m doing right now: Sit­ting here in the quiet of my own home, explor­ing my thoughts, feel­ings and beliefs by putting them into tan­gi­ble form in this blog.

3. Who is your best friend and why do they deserve that honor?

I don’t have one “best friend.” I am blessed to have a group of folks with whom I have been friends for many, many years. We know each other well, we knew each other “when,” and we will lit­er­ally be “friends to the end”. There is a lot to be said for hang­ing around with folks who shared a locker with you in high school and saw you through your first big crush.

4. What are some of the things you love about where you live?

It is still very much a small town with small town allure. It is a clean, well-ordered place where peo­ple take good care of their homes and yards, and being part of a fam­ily is the priority.

5. Do you have any regrets? (this is just a great ques­tion for everyone)

I don’t believe in regret. You can’t change the past so sit­ting around feel­ing bad about it is a com­plete mis­di­rec­tion of energy. The Divine wants us to focus on the many bless­ings in our life right here and now, and look to the future.

If you would like to par­tic­i­pate, leave a com­ment and I will e-mail five ques­tions to you!

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