Black Girl, White Mom: Part 2

So my last post, I stomped my mama bear paw and pointed my finger and wondered out loud.

Was it possible, just merely possible, that I watched my daughter experience racism?

I wondered, with doubt, given "our day and age" the "setting and circumstance."

I wondered because frankly I don't want to believe this is what I saw.

I don't want to believe that happened.

The weekend continued with much discussion and thought, as I expected it would.

I've had lots of comments both public and private.

The more that people say to me, with completely pure intentions, let it go, you probably misunderstood the situation, the less able I am to stop replaying it.

I do truly know all the different variations on kids will be kids and mean girls and bullying and so on. I really do.  I grew up the weird kid. The super short kid. The kid with glasses. The kid with the dental head gear. I had kids pick on me for things I didn't even think of.

I know that my kid can often be a big old pain in the butt and people don't want to be around her.

In the vein of kids will be kids, I know that sometimes kids do just ignore other kids for no other reason than they can.

My family moved around a lot when I was in school. Just the luck of the draw. Navigating social waters could be tricky.

I know what it's like to be shunned and ignored.

My first week of high school in a small town, I was the new kid.  I moved into the tiny city the summer between 8th grade and high school.

That first week, not a single student spoke to me.

Not. One. Word.

Why?

As far as I can tell, it was because I was the new kid.

Things happen. To all of us.

I wonder though, if the blog responses, your responses, had been different if I had laid out my feelings and my daughters experience and never ever shared that she was the only black child on  her team.

I wonder if your responses would have been different if I had never used words like racism.

Part of what's getting to me and making me think, no, I'm not wrong, I saw what I saw and what I saw was my daughter experiencing racism, is how many of you are saying to me, you probably saw something else.

Why does it ruffle feathers so much?

Another piece of the puzzle, that is sort of cementing the issue for me, is the oblivious consent by omission from the other parents present.

These are still little kids we're talking about. These are little girls, still at the ages where we as moms are still really jumping in, hands on, trying to coach and teach our kids the ins and outs of making and keeping good girl friends. This is the age where we are still helping our kids make introductions to each other and help them make small talk and find things in common.

And yes, before you ask it, I did, on the very first day, go with my girl and help her make those introductions. We tried hard to make the small talk and start the connections. I know they don't happen instantly. I never expected her to play on this team and make a lifetime best friend.

I did hope though, for some smiles and small talk for her.

What I saw this weekend though, struck me as something that is bigger and stretches further than my girl being shunned by a few other girls.

I noticed that I was the only parent noticing.

None of the other parents saw what I saw.

I saw my girl walk over to the after game area. She was one of the first ones there, because she was walking alone. She picked a spot to sit, right in the middle!

Way to go, Little Miss. Stick yourself back in, even if they have given you the cold shoulder for an hour. She put her water bottle on the table in front of her chair. Then she got up to come hug me. She went back to her spot to find no chair left for her.

It happens.

Kids do stuff.

But there were moms in chairs sitting by their girls. They looked like tired moms, even if they were 20 years my junior, with this little 7 year old princess being their oldest. I'm sure they never gave a second thought to the one little girl without a chair.

That is part of what bugs me. They didn't give her a second thought. Why?

Not one offered up a chair to my girl.

She didn't complain or ask. She just stood through the coach talk time. No big deal really. It doesn't take long.

She didn't ask or complain when everyone was handed a snack and she was skipped over until the girl passing out the snack noticed there was one left in the bag. The girl handing out the snacks was sitting next to where my girl was standing, and she didn't start passing out treats with herself. She finished up with herself. Then noticed.

Mountain out of a molehill, you say to me.

Probably.

Kids just being kids.

Could be.

Maybe she is too shy or too much.

That could be it.

It probably isn't what you're thinking it is.

It can't be what you are so boldly and rudely saying it might be.

Not among all these affluent, well educated, Christian, team playing, well meaning, genuinely good natured and well intentioned pale people.

I wonder, no, I need to know what it is that makes my black daughter invisible in a sea of pink people.

And I need to learn in a hurry how to be her mama because I suddenly see so very clearly that I can't just go about mothering her the way I would if she were pink like me.

Being a mom is being a mom, right?

That's what you're thinking right?

I always thought so, right up until the moment I realized my daughter was invisible.

White Mama, Black Daughter; Fierce or Invisible

Good or bad for all of you, I process the events of my life pen to paper here in this space.

This one might be long and winding, jumbled and brutal. I'm pretty certain it won't be for the faint of heart.

My daughter is 7 and I am just beginning to fully realize the extent of what it will be, to be her mama for life.

I am being forced to see things in the world that I always thought I saw but never really did.

I am being forced to become a fierce woman.

I have experiences now, with my daughter, that other people don't believe actually happen, because "that doesn't happen in America anymore," because "people aren't like that anymore."

I witness things with my own eyes that I literally can't believe are actually happening. I can't believe they are happening and happening to my daughter because of the above sentences. I have believed those phrases for most of my life.

When I start asking around to friends and listen to their responses to what I tell them I think I might have seen or experienced or lived, their answers almost force me to believe I never should have doubted my experience in the first place. They simply give me the kinder, gentler, more appropriately Christian-ized version of "that kind of thing really doesn't happen." It's code for "you're being paranoid".

So, either I'm crazy-which is possible and I'm investigating that just to make sure I'm not cracking up in the mind-or, what I think I'm experiencing is actually what is really happening right before my eyes to my daughter.

I'm not typically the sports parent in our pair here at home. I don't do a lot of the practices or games and if I do get the tap for that, I am a drop off and come back sort of parent. I like to trust in the coaches and kids and other parents that they will be kind and reasonable and all of that. I like to let the kids have small doses of "safe" spaces to test out their independence.

Today was the first time I had parent duty at my daughter's basketball game.

In our church.

In a Christian sports organization.

Come as you are.

This is the place I am being forced to learn to be a fierce woman.

If those big brown eyes hadn't been locking with mine all through the game I would have walked out, locked myself in a bathroom and bawled my eyes out.

Instead, I blinked. I bit my tongue. I gave her the thumbs up.

I gave her smiles and eye contact.

To me, she is not invisible.

I confirmed that she is real and does exist and was in fact part of that team and playing well.

By the end of the game and the end of the coach's post game wrap up and the end of the snack passing out, I wanted to stand on a table and scream at those little porcelain princesses and their prissy mama's and all the other stereotype groups of people I suddenly saw all around me.

I didn't.

I took my baby by the hand and walked away from the group with her. I knelt down on the floor and looked at her face.

This is supposed to be fun. It should have been a happy, excited face. It was sad and quiet and looking at the floor, not at me.

I asked her a question, "Do any of the girls on your team ever talk to you?"

She just kept on looking at the floor and shook her head, acting like she was in trouble or had done something wrong.

I asked more questions. She kept acting like she had done something wrong.

"Do you ever get to sit with any of them on the bench or do you always sit by yourself?"
"Do they always squeeze 2 girls to a chair so they don't have to sit next to you?"
"Do they always turn their back to you and put their heads together like that whispering and not including you?"
"Do any of the coaches ever notice you are the only girl watching the game from the bench?"
"Does the coach always stand in front of you, so you can't see the game?"

She just quietly put on her pants and coat, picked up her snack and water bottle and asked if we could go.

In the truck she said once in a while one of them will smile at her and sometimes they let her sit with them. She explained all this to me with that hopeful voice that left me wondering if she was trying to convince herself or me that it wasn't so hard.

I asked her if maybe today was just an off day on the bench. Then she remembered, one of the girls did talk to her today.

The little girl told her she couldn't have two friends.

My baby asked me if I wanted half her cookie because it might make me feel better.

How fitting to look over my shoulder in the rear view mirror and see her snapping a heart in half.

Half a broken heart cookie doesn't fix this hurt, because I wanted to believe it wasn't real.

All my life, until now, I have believed in some way or another, because I didn't live it, that it wasn't really real.

My little girl is invisible to her team.

She's not WNBA material at 7, but her skills are at least as good as any other girl on that team.

My daughter isn't invisible.

My daughter is black.

But they may as well be the very same thing.

This is the thing that is driving me to become her very fierce mama.

When I asked around about my experience this morning, my moments of did I really just see this very subtle "acceptable" racism, I got three answers.

1. Yup, I've seen the very same thing happen to her at a different time and setting.
2. Yes, I see it. It's real and it's sad.
3. Well, she has a "big" personality and that can drive people away...

That combination made it solid for me.

Yeah, my girl does have a huge personality, and she will unleash it on you, but only if you are one of the few that she trusts. For the rest of the world, she is shy, quiet, polite, well mannered, kind, patient, all the things you would want your child to grow to become, and yet, it doesn't serve her well. In some weird sick twist it makes her even more invisible.

My girl isn't invisible.

My girl is black.

Being black isn't her fault. It should not be her punishment.

But it will be.

Driving home today I realized, it doesn't matter how good she is on the court. She can match the white girls, skill for skill, but they can't see her or respect her or befriend her.

No wonder black women become a force to reckon with as adults.

My girl will have to have skills, at anything, that are double or triple her white female peers to even begin to be noticed at an equal level.

For her entire life, she is going to always have to work harder and be better. Not just the "women have to work harder than a man to get the same notice or praise or prize as a man", but as a black woman she is going to have to pour out an effort that is so far beyond that, I am speechless thinking about it.

I would never begin to claim that I understood what it is to live life as a black woman. Over my life, I've respected them in a way, kept my distance to be sure, feared them definitely.

All of a sudden though, I see them differently.

Hell, I'm struck by the fact that in our present day world, where "that sort of thing doesn't still happen" I am fully aware and recognizing that until now, I have always thought of it as us and them.

Where I used to see something I couldn't identify or didn't want to identify, I now see a fierce strength. I see warriors. I see survivors.

I can honestly say I now see something in a black woman that I can respect more than I can say.

I have a few white women friends that have adopted black daughters.

They are fierce women, a force to be reckoned with.

Not one of them is going to let their daughter grow up being invisible to anyone.

I'm not going to let her grow up being invisible either.

She is black.

She is amazing and beautiful and fierce.

And those little porcelain princesses, well, they're a dime a dozen and they are the one's missing out. If they could see beyond her brown skin, they could befriend an incredible little survivor.

I doubt the tears I shed today over my "invisible" black daughter are the last ones on our journey to being fierce, but they are the last ones to come with the sense of shock over the level of acceptable racism and bullying.

Or maybe, none of this is really real. Maybe it's just kids being kids. Maybe it's a hypersensitive paranoid mama with a mixed race family fishing for a reason for the treatment her child received. Maybe she asked for it or had it coming. Maybe she deserved it or brought it on herself.

Who Is The Better Liar?

So July may not have been the best month to decide to get back into the habit of daily blogging.

I missed on the 4th of July. We had a party, as always, and I had my hands plenty full with some of my small kids and general party shenanigans. I didn't like the prompt for the day anyway, so I'm digressing.

The prompt for today now, is something someone said in conversation:  "Christians are better liars than everyone else."

Ho! Ho!

Now there's a statement, don't you think?

Here's the thing, the more I thought about it, the more I thought, oh yeah, there is something there.

There is some truth to that statement.

I'm going to say that we couch it under the guise of grace and good manners, but Christians are liars.

I'm not talking about the embezzling kind of lying or the big scandal kind, I'm talking the little stuff. The lies of fantastic coffee cakes and your children are so well behaved when they're at my house. The lies of how much you loved the last book club book or how thrilled you are to be included in the latest potluck marriage mixer night.

These are the lies we tell with more sincerity and conviction than our non-Christian counterparts.

How and why?

Well, I suspect it goes like this.

The how happens when we trick ourselves into believing the why. The more we believe the why, the easier it is to sincerely lie. Why we tell the lies is simple really.

We simply have the idea that as Christians we need to be nice.

And we do need to be nice, but not the fake nice. We have confused love your neighbor and your enemy as yourself with be nice at all costs. We believe we need to be nicer than everyone else because we misguidedly think we're showing grace. We have a bit of a superiority complex too.

Our non-Christian counterparts are far less concerned about offending someone or hurting their feelings by simply telling the truth. When asked if they like the book, more often they will say no, give a reason and not worry if they have offended you or your religion or somehow harmed your tiny little feelings. They simply believe that there are no other motives, they have nothing to prove, they offer up their opinion believing that you genuinely asked for it.

There is no play to see who is more Christian by out nice-ing the others.

I don't know if I'm making this idea clear to you, but let's have a go at it in the comments, shall we?

Love People. I Dare You

Some of you keep up with me by Facebook and some of you keep up here, not a lot of you are in both places.

I don't want you to miss this one though.

Single Dad Laughing is a good blog.  He writes a lot of truth.  I don't love or agree with it all, but who agrees with everything, right?

You may have read and remember this post.  It's worth going back and read it again.

Dan has written another pretty amazing post.

You shouldn't miss it.

It made me think again about one of my life experiences.  Years ago I read the Bible cover to cover.  My take away was this Christian thing might not be as complicated as we make it out to be.  To me, the Bible said, "love God first, then love people."  It was that simple.

I believe still that it is that simple.

We forget.  Under the labels, people are just people.

Love people.

Now, go read.

Anything Other than Straight

Love Goes Viral

Sometimes good things happen on the Internet.  Sometimes very good things.


Something very good is happening over at Single Dad Laughing.

Take a look at these two posts.  They are well worth every second you spend reading them.


This: http://www.danoah.com/2011/11/im-christian-unless-youre-gay.html

and this: http://www.danoah.com/2011/11/powerful-responses-to-im-christian-unless-youre-gay-blog.html

Love is not judgement, but grace.

I for one would rather stand in front of God at my judgment and plead my case for having loved too many without bounds.

Be Kind

Abuse is abuse. Period.

Abuse is all up in the news again these days.  There are a pack of nasty adults doing the unthinkable to kids.

As Christians we talk a lot about how sin is sin.  No sin is greater than the other.  There is no sliding scale, even though we like to see it that way.  It's our human nature it seems, to be bent on justification.  We are forever saying to ourselves, well, sure, I did xyz wrong, but it's not as bad as him because he did abc.

An abuser is a bully and a bully is an abuser.  It's all about power, no matter the "issue".

Maybe it's about race.  Maybe it's about your social status.  Maybe it's about your religion.  Maybe it's about your politics.  Maybe it's about your disease.  Maybe it's because you are challenged or handicapped in some way.  Maybe it's about your lover.

Abuse happens to adults and kids.  Sometimes it's physical, sometimes it's not.  Neglect counts.  Words count.  With holding love or support counts.  Abuse can look like a lot of different things, but you know it when you feel it.

We cannot discount each others experiences.  I cannot say to someone, well, your momma didn't beat you with an electric cord so you were never abused by the years of her saying you were stupid.  I can't say to a person, oh well, you weren't raped in the locker room, so enduring years of being called names wasn't abuse.  So what if your family didn't furniture or food because the money went to drugs or alcohol, that's not abuse because no one hit you and your body bears no physical scar.

Yes, they are different, but they are the same.

I don't want any of my kids to be bullied for any reason.  Not because they're short or fat or wear glasses or want a same sex partner or want to practice a non-mainstream religion.  I don't want them bullied because their eyes are slanted or their skin is brown or they are deaf.  I don't want them abused because they are Autistic or walk with a limp or have birth parents in jail.

Just as each one of us is made of a million and one unique distinctions, that leaves us a million and one "reasons" to judge and bully.

Be kind to each other.

I Protest The Protest

*****I heard after the last blog, I should have given the tissue needed warning. This one is the hot topic warning. If you have abortion issues, skip todays blog.****

I don't get excited about too much, but driving my car down the road today there was a large group of people I really considered running over...okay, maybe not really, but they got me stirred up.

I realize that being a very large protest, that was their general ambition, to stir things up, but they probably weren't looking for the mental conversation that I had with myself. I'm betting they were looking for some affirmation that they were right.

The protest in itself was impressive. There were a couple hundred people lining a pretty busy road. They all had signs. In fact, there was not a single person that didn't hold a sign.

Most of them read, "Abortion kills children". A few said something about Jesus forgives or God heals or some such similar thing. There were a handful of Adoption is the Answer signs.

I had the great good luck to drive this 2-3 mile stretch of road twice, once on the way out of town and once on the way back in. Being that it's about an hour round trip for me, I had some time to think about all this.

One of my thoughts was that if I didn't have a whole car full of kids, I'd love to stop the car and talk to some of these wonderful people.

Why?

Cause I have a couple of questions that went along these lines.

Wow! This is impressive. You have a couple hundred people out here. How many babies did you save in the hours you've been standing out here freezing your butts off and causing a traffic disruption? You know, cause there were a few people that just felt the need to keep jumping out into the road. How many pregnant women pulled over and asked for help? And how did you help them?

You know, all those signs must of cost a pretty penny to get printed. I mean, you know, probably a couple hundred dollars, maybe enough to pay for a prenatal doctor visit or pay a tiny bit of the adoption cost, you know, seeing as how you're suggesting adoption as the answer.

I'm just curious, again, because a fair amount of those beautiful signs suggest that adoption is the answer, how many of you lovely protesters have adopted kids that were going to be aborted?

There was another really interesting thing I noticed about the protesters. It was their age. The majority of these protesters were easily in their 50's and beyond. I only saw a handful of people in their 30's or 40's. Thankfully, at least in my mind, there were only a dozen or so kids (under 12) standing out there with signs.

I have a couple of thoughts about this, of course! About the little kids, I'm wondering how these parents exactly explained abortion to their kids. Now over here, we're pretty dang forward about teaching our kids the facts of life. I have no plan of being preempted by the playground or the public school to teach about sex. I want my kids to know the facts early on so there is no confusion or shock about how things work and I want them to very clearly know my expectations of how they are to behave regarding sex in their lives. That said, as we drove past all this drama, one of my older boys said, "Hey Mom, what are all those people protesting?" Yeah, somehow, even my oldest kids have not been taught about this "option". Somehow it hasn't seemed like a necessary bit of information at this point in their lives. Just saying.

It really got me wondering what a 4 year old or a 2 year old out on the side of the road thinks their holding up a sign about.

The next thing I really started thinking about was the fact that the majority of these protesting folks were the over 50 crowd. It is interesting on a couple of fronts. First, you're well past the age of abortion, at least the ladies. The men, well, if they have girl friends that want abortions at their ages, it just justifies why I loath things like Viagra commercials.

Anyway.

I started thinking who is this message targeted at.

Well, it would by my generation and those younger than me, so hang on here just a second. This message is targeted at their own kids and grand kids! Isn't there a better way to communicate this information?

And really? Isn't it pretty commonly known that the abortion kills? I mean, let's not sugar coat it. When it comes right down to it, no matter when you think a life begins, you're killing something that either is a child or has the potential to become a child. But this is the US. I'm thinking it's pretty well known that that's what an abortion is and does. Do we really need a couple hundred people holding signs on the side of the road pointing this out?

Um, yeah.

So abortion was legalized when I was 2, so really the first generations of people to take "advantage" of this, if you will, were the Baby Boomers and the Hippie Love generation. I get it, that now, later, looking back at their lives, they may be rethinking some of the life choices they made. I get that they want to give some better advice to the younger generations, but again, these are your kids and grand kids that you're wanting to influence. Maybe just try talking to them honestly. That usually goes a long way.

Of course, then again, maybe that's what happened in your own life. You had or didn't have those honest conversations about sex. Maybe you chose to rebel and do it anyway. Who knows.

I guess it just peaked my interest that this particular age group would be the ones out there protesting.

I mean, I just figure most of us in the US get it. Abortion is not a great choice. Even when you think it's the answer and the best choice, you pretty much have to live under a rock to think it's not going to haunt you for the rest of your life. I mean, really? Again, skip the candy coating, it's pretty well known that there is a pretty high chance of some sort of negative after effects at one point or another in your life after an abortion. In my experience working with college and high school kids in the last 10 years, I'd say they're pretty clued in about this too.

So what was the real point of all those people standing out there, freezing their butts off on a cold Wisconsin afternoon?

I couldn't quite pin it down until I drove past the last few people and caught the utter smugness on their faces.

The sound track running through my head was to the tune of "You Give Love a Bad Name". Listen with me, You give Christ a Bad rep.

You know. That was a place, a moment in time, when I thought how is it possible that we all call ourselves Christians and yet can be so different?

It really wasn't about saving lives at all. It was about conviction and pride. Look at me, I'm so righteous and you're so sinful. I can't wait to stand here and show everyone how perfect I am and how evil you are.

I can't shake that smug face looking back at me through the windshield.

Don't Stop Now

Again with the prayer thing?

Why yes, again.

We're in that stretch where life is piling up, it's hard.

It's the waiting part of praying and having faith.

I cannot focus and so this will sound list-ish.

A concussion is not something you bounce back from quickly. In fact, being the parent of the concussion is a bit unnerving. The symptoms are enough to make you uneasy. Littlest Mr. is not himself. The simplest task is suddenly a challenge. His personality has taken a sharp shift. It is hard not to have concern that these will be long term consequences of playing a game he loved.

There are other consequences from this head hit too. Will he be able to come back at all this season? Is it wise for us to let him even play this sport again? Will it shake his lion heart? Should we push our Disney trip out further? Could we do more damage to him by letting him ride rides already in November?

I am simultaneously holding two seemingly opposite things in my head right now with Little One.

I cannot seem to reconcile or make peace with the idea that God will allow these 2 men to be the parents of these 3 kids. In my mind it doesn't seem possible that this could be God's will for these kids, regardless of whether they end up with me.

At the same time, they're likable, decent guys. They're doing a pretty good job with the siblings, especially considering they went from no kids to 2 school age kids overnight. That's a hard thing for anyone. And on paper, right now, it looks like there is no hope of anything but Little One going there.

I cannot definitively say we are the best home. I have a pile of reasons why we are, but there are a pile of reasons why he should go too.

I'm sticking my head in the sand on practical matters. I'm ignoring the time ticking away when it comes to sorting out his toys from ours and packing his clothes and so on.

I'm allowing the garbage talk to creep into my mind about all the to do's that are sliding, like my homework, my house work, my house projects and my home organizing. I've let my hair go, skipped my make up more days than I have in years and years and have enjoyed far to many bites of chocolate. I'm short tempered, short on sleep and patience.

I'm keeping appointments and going to meetings and even taking some time out with friends for the sake of sanity, but on the same hand, feeling guilty for missing a single minute with Little One and feeling the pull to hover over the recovery of Littlest Mr. With Little One it's that need to squeeze in enough of everything to last him the rest of his life just in case and yet simultaneously knowing in a matter of months, maybe even just a few short weeks we won't even be a distant memory.

It can't be sugar coated. That's really life and really how it is. And in a way, it's probably a bit of a blessing for him if he can't remember us after he's gone.

So I'm praying. A lot. For God to shake the foundations in this case. I need Him to do whatever it takes to make His will for these kids happen. At the same time, I need to have some sort of understanding or peace or some way to navigate what happens when there is no "miracle" and Little One moves on exactly as the court papers say he will. I'm praying for a bit of release from the guilt I'm feeling as I look around my life and see all the things that are happening as we've begun to pray in earnest for an about face in the case.

We're praying for the unthinkable and all around us things are going haywire. The kids got sick. Littlest Mr. got a huge injury. A car broke. Things in the house broke. People really close to us and really praying hard on our behalf are having major medical things happen in their families...to their kids. It is unthinkable that we should ask, no beg, for them to continue to pray on our behalf. The risks... An organization we are involved with is coming unglued in a weird way.

What can I say? If you don't believe, this is the mere grabbing at straws of a woman on the edge of loss, if you do believe, right now you have goosebumps at the force of the attack.

A Church Fail?

I'm noticing something interesting lately and I'm not really sure exactly what I think about it, but I'd love to get some discussion going around here. I think it's a bit of a big topic and that there are going to major underlying issues that led to what I'm noticing now. I'd say what's got my attention is symptoms of something bigger that I don't quite have my finger on yet.

So let's get started.

What I'm noticing is a certain disconnect in the land of Christianity, or at least modern American church Christianity. There are some people who have crossed my path in the last few months that have shared some interesting stories. They told me their tales of how they came to the place of leaving their church and more interestingly how the church responded. Now, I'd say these aren't big important people in the church, but shouldn't we all, to an extent, be peers in the church. A novel idea, I guess. I'm sure someone will give me the Biblical lecture as to my incorrectness. Thanks for the references.

These are the sort of people who are easily dismissed. And let's be honest, there are just groups of people that we love to over look. We all do it. We each have our own groups of people that we over look and dismiss, whether it's the business man dismissing the 20 somethings or the jocks dismissing the preps or the stay home moms dismissing the working moms.

On the other hand, though, these are the reliable people, the loyal people. These are the sort of people who volunteer over and over and over even though they're getting the blank stare from the pastor who, after having them as a key volunteer for years on end, ought to know more about them than their first name, if they even know that.

These kind of people, what I'll call the basic body of the church people, for lack of a better label, are beginning to leave their churches. And who can blame them. They're burnt out. They're under appreciated. They're misunderstood and in spite of knowing a lot of church people and having a lot of church friends, they're lonely. The friends they have aren't deep. The friends they have a great at giving all the correct Biblical advice that allows them to stand in the position of righteous Christian church goer, but where are the people being real? Where are the people wanting to dig into something together?

The basic body people are believers, they're rule followers, they're not the sort that leave churches easily or willy-nilly because they no longer like the song format or the new and improved bulletin. These are people who spend many months in prayer. They seek out opinions and council about whether or not to leave their church. They stay long after they believe they've come to a decision about leaving.

It's interesting in two fronts. The most obvious interest is why are these people, the basic body people, leaving their churches. The second interest, the one I wonder about more, is the reaction from those in the church at large to those who are leaving. We'll call this group of people in the church, the followers, for lack of a better term.

I'm thinking followers because they are typically the ones that know all the Sunday school answers and can easily regurgitate any amount of mostly sound Biblical back up they need. I'm not about to speculate on their believer-ness status. That's between them and God, as is most of this in reality. These are the people who participate in a lot of stuff and are by all visible accounts great church going people.

Maybe, I personally, am just tired of the simple church going breed. I'm greedy. I want, I expect so much more from being a believer.

As I have watched these stories unfold and listened to the tales told over the last few months, I'm really struck by the response of the follower group. They are almost condemning these basic body people for their choice to move on to another church. They heap on advice and evidence and scripture. They actually pile on guilt.

Why?

Is it fear? Are we confused about the body of the church and what the church really is? Is it a power thing?

I almost forgot, there's another thing that I think ties into all this, but I'm not sure how exactly. For myself, I'm not unhappy exactly, with my current church, but there are things... I find myself, seeking out extras. I will confess to downloading podcasts of sermons from other places that I find to be so much more interesting, challenging, whatever and I wonder if that's a "wrong" thing to do?

Talk to me kids, what do you think? Tell me your story and your experience. I know there is no shortage of opinion out there on this one, so let's talk this weekend, shall we? See you in the comments.