From St. Luke's to St. James
After being a member of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Atlanta for almost 12 years, I have decided to transfer my membership to St. James Episcopal Church in Marietta.
The last several weeks have been a serious time of reflection and re-evaluation about my involvement in church. Over the past few years I had been gravitating toward the smaller services at St. Luke's: the 6 pm service (which doesn't exist any more) and the 8 am service (which I'd been attending less and less frequently because of the drive time from Marietta to Atlanta). St. James has a Saturday 5:30 pm Eucharist which reminds me a lot of the old 6 pm service at St. Luke's. It's a “folk mass” style service featuring a jazz combo (this past Saturday the closing processional was “Ornithology” by Charlie Parker). They also have a weekly Eucharist and Healing service on Wednesdays at 5:30 pm. It was at this service last Wednesday that I felt a very strong confirmation that transferring to St. James was the right thing for me to do. This morning I met with the Rector of St. James, the Reverend Karen Evans, and gave her the paperwork requesting the transfer.
From a practical point of view, St. James is literally five minutes away (two miles) from my apartment. St. James is very actively involved in outreach to the community -- my community, my hometown where I grew up and have lived and worked all my life. St. James, like St. Luke's, is a gay-friendly parish with an emphasis on healing. There's also a contemplative element: they have a center for spiritual direction at the church, and they have a canvas Labyrinth which they roll out for quiet days. They also have two EFM (Education For Ministry) groups; I have completed three years of this four-year program and plan to begin the final year this Fall. And my being a Sufi is not a problem; the Rector told me this morning that she did her master's thesis on Christian and Sufi spirituality.
I will always be grateful to St. Luke's for so many things, primarily for being a safe and sacred place for me to come out of my fundamentalist closet and learn to accept myself as the person God created me to be. (I wrote about this in my first article for Whosoever, Journey of Faith, Journey of Acceptance.) St. Luke's has literally transformed my life for the better. I will miss St. Luke's, but I am looking forward to what the Spirit has in store for me at St. James.
posted by Darrell Grizzle | 7:39 PM
7 Comments:
It sounds wonderful!
Really! I've got to say it sounds like it was made for you. It's not every Episcopalian rector who has studied Sufism!
Frim on, brother!
Thank you for sharing this.
It is good to see that others can find comfort in the context of jesus worship.
Me, I have been hurt too many times by jesus worshippers (and jesus?) to ever consider such an endeavor.
Also, you are fortunate to have this outlet near your residence, and wise to use it. I see people burning fossil fuels to drive 20+ miles one way to their weekly jesus party, and I wonder why.
I have never been to an episcopal service. I do have one question: does the preacher yell at the worshippers? This verbal violence is one of the things that disgust me about jesus worship.
I followed the link to the story of your journey. There is much I could say about your story, and my story, and perhaps one day I will. Now, I need to get up in seven hours and work, and cannot give this effort the energy it deserves. “Blessed be” will have to do.
Dear chamblee54,
No, Episcopalian ministers do not shout at their congregations. I grew up in a little Baptist church where the preacher shouted and yelled at us, and I've had quite enough of it!
"Blessed be" to you too!
bearhugs,
Darrell
I am thrilled that you have found a new spiritual home. Having recently started attending a new church (after 12 years of no church at all) and then finding the minister is leaving, I am finding myself again in a state of limbo not sure what to do. We all have a spiritual place in this world - in fact, we all probably have several.
Both of these churches sound wonderful. It is so outside my experience of church!
Sounds like a hard decision, but it also sounds like you're doing the right thing. Good luck!
My wife/partner, Me Wonder Woman Pez, is in Atlanta this weekend for work! I wish I were with her.
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