Complications of Community

I am reminded of a scene I dearly love from the movie Parenthood:

Mother: Life is messy.
Father: l hate messy.
Grandma: You know, when I was nineteen, Grandpa took me on a roller coaster. Up, down, up, down. Oh, what a ride! I always wanted to go again. You know, it was just so interesting to me that a ride could make me so frightened, so scared, so sick, so excited, and so thrilled all together! Some didn't like it. They went on the merry-go-round. That just goes around. Nothing. I like the roller coaster. You get more out of it.

You sometimes hear people saying that their "church" is taking a long solitary walk in the woods. As I hiker, I can relate to the feeling of oneness with nature, and the spiritual aspect. But church? Mmm, I don't think of it as that. I think of that old rhyme we did while interlacing our fingers as children:

This is the church
And this is the steeple
Open the doors
And see all the people.

My friend and colleague, the Rev. Cynthia Landrum, has used a phrase that caught my attention: "complications of community."

Church is complicated. For one thing, we don't offer a curated experience. That is wildly counter-cultural for 2026, when you think about it. Like, I remember when I was a kid, buying a whole album for one song. And then falling in love with the album itself, not just the hits. But now, you can get on a streaming service and only play the hits, no b-sides, nothing else.

Now, you don't have to buy a whole newspaper, you can read just the articles you're interested in. When you turn on the tv, you're not limited to what happens to be playing right at that time, you literally have decades of movies and shows to choose from. Sitting on your couch, hungry, and the other person wants a burger while you want a taco? No problem, DoorDash can bring both.

But then you come to church and while there is some element of "choose your own adventure" (do you want to be in a Journey Circle? Choir? Do you want to teach? Do you want to help feed our neighbors?), there are other parts that are not, like the worship service. We have preferences, nothing wrong with that. But the church doesn't make decisions based on preference; we make them hopefully out of our best thinking - our guiding principles and best practices.

Being part of a church, or any committed community, is not for people who require everything to be neat, uncomplicated, conflict-free, and all according to their taste. It's messy. But it's also a spiritual discipline that helps us grow in our self-differentiation and generosity. The hymn that I really dislike (and yes, there are some), may be the hymn that another person loves and needs to hear that Sunday.

We live in a world that, especially to those of us with privilege, gives us the message that what we want is the most important thing. But our religious values give us a different message. Justice, equity, transformation, pluralism, interdependence, and generosity -- all centered in love -- move us to a place of openness.

Community is complicated. But I like the roller coaster. You get more out of it.