Perseverance of the Church

Photo by Annie Spratt.

by Andrew Yang

I was speaking with a friend after a Sunday service when we remarked on someone we hadn’t seen in a while at church. She told me how she still sees them in bars, restaurants, and passing on the street, but not at church. “That’s my whole neighborhood,” she said sadly. I knew exactly what she meant. We had both joined the church at the same time, and of the people who joined at the same time as us, most of them were no longer members. These were individuals that we’d been friends with, that we’d seen graduate and get married, that had bought houses in the same areas of Philadelphia close to one another. Some of them had announced their decisions to leave, while others had slowly drifted away so that it was a little while before we realized that it had been a long time since we’d seen them on Sunday.

Reasons for leaving

Many of the congregants who attend my church are individuals who have been wounded in some way by institutional religion. Therefore, we’ve become very familiar with people leaving churches because of their inflexibility or intolerance, because of their hypocrisy or internal politics. Many of these people are those who are desperately want to believe, but can’t stomach the homophobia, nationalism, or racism of the churches they come from, or want a safe place to explore shades of doubt and belief without being shamed or shunned. Because of this, my church functions for many as the last stop on their way to a complete loss of faith, or at least a complete loss of faith in the institutional church.

The hurt when people leave

Losing people is hard for me. It’s hard to lose friends, or see people conclude that the church that I love so much has failed them, or that they’ve grown beyond it. It’s difficult to lose partners in the work that I do. My ministry in and out of the church tends to circle around issues of racial injustice and incarceration. I’ve seen a number of brilliant people that I’ve admired and worked with who are motivated by a deep faith of Jesus, who after a time decide that our church is too inflexible or isn’t doing enough. Their next stop isn’t usually at any other church. It’s to stop going to church altogether. It’s to conclude that the church, in its institutional form, is not the best way to convey the love of Jesus to people.

Understanding why

I often see their points. The church moves at the speed of the slowest member, especially when we’re dedicated to agreement. We frequently say that we “agree to agree,” that is, we are devoted to dialogue until we can agree with one another. Those who are involved in justice work have a difficult enough time facing opposition in the outside world, and it’s not surprising at all that they don’t have the energy to justify themselves to members of the church who are supposed to be supportive.

Peace whether home or away

When I was younger I was taught the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints, that is, salvation once gained, can’t be lost. Because of that, for much of my young life, the idea of a person leaving the church was unfathomable. I’m learning now to make peace with the fact that I will lose friends and partners. I’m making peace with the fact that some of my friends are leaving the city, or divorcing one another, or leaving the church, or losing their faith, and yet God is still somehow at work. They might never find their way back to the church, but I can still love them and work with them.

I still believe in the church. I’ve seen the good that it can do in creating families for people who have none, and welcoming people who are welcomed nowhere else. I’ve been part of creating liturgies and music that help people see God in new ways, I’ve been part of bailing out people who are incarcerated only because they’re poor, I’ve been part of efforts to provide sanctuary to refugee families, all because of the church. At the same time, every time someone leaves, it’s a wound, and I’m learning to live with those wounds and hope for healing. Jesus in Luke 18:8 said, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” I wonder if he knew the answer any more than I do, and I find comfort in that. The best I can hope for is perseverance of the kind that Paul wrote about repeatedly in his letters—like running a race, and hoping that I run it well and make it to the end.

Andrew Yang is an attorney and organizer in Philadelphia.