Churches

We went to another church yesterday. We've actually been going every other week for a couple of months. Now that our commitment to our current church in Boulder is over, we aren't planning on heading back to that church over the summer. Possibly not even in the fall. This new church is small. It's so not our style that it's a little scary to me. But, our desire for community has taken over. We just hit our 3 year mark in Colorado, and still don't feel like we're part of anything.

It's interesting - the prospect of changing churches. It's not definite, but the chances are high. I don't want to run the risk again of staying at a place where I don't feel connected. Although I've tried, I feel like I've exhausted all avenues at our current church. We started going to our church in Boulder in July of 2007. We both liked the pastor and worship on Sundays. We were also excited about a couples/marrieds class on Sunday mornings, and I was excited about the prospect of MOPS and the women's Bible study group all being at the same church. I'd been sort of all over the map back in the bay area - doing a mom's group/Bible study in Menlo Park, a playgroup with women from and not from our church, and then going to our church. I was envious of the bond that some of the women in my mom's group had, and part of that was their shared experience of attending the same church, mom's group, and living in close proximity with each other. I wanted that for myself.

The problem, we've found, at our current church has been that we really just don't fit in anywhere. We haven't found our niche. The MOPS group at our church in Boulder was nice - I really liked it the first year - but I felt old. Much older than all but a few women in the group. Same with the couples/marrieds group. It was very much for young couples - "young" being the operative word. We'd been through so much of the "improving your marriage", "improving your parenting" before, and weren't all that interested in repeating it. I worked in childcare for a while, but I found that not only was I exhausted taking care of other children when I spent all my time taking care of my own, but that I was also getting sick ALL.THE.TIME. I'm not joking when I say that I had to stop for my own health! The women's Bible study had promise, but I had a bad experience with my very first small group that has tainted my experience with the group in general since then. Plus, one of the leaders of that first small group is now one of the leaders of the whole women's group. It doesn't make going to Wednesday morning Bible study all that much to look forward to. Our church draws from a more conservative crowd than we're use to. Most people with kids our age are younger than us. Sometimes by more than a decade. People our age have much older children and are in a completely different phase of life. Age and life stages shouldn't be a reason for being unable to find community. However, we're not finding relationships. I'm just not relating. We have very little in common with these other people. The fact that our church also draws from communities north and east of Boulder doesn't help. We live south of there, and the combination of miles, times, and my new personal schedule with school aged children isn't conducive to get togethers and outings.

So, we decided to make changes. After much searching, I found that I couldn't locate any mom's groups (for moms with kids of all ages), so I started attending a different MOPS group in Boulder. I knew a couple of women from Brandon's school who went there. Lo and behold, many of the women there live near me, too (only a few people in my previous MOPS group lived within 10 miles of me). I don't live on the cusp of society, so to speak, for the population of this group. We started attending a small, local church about 5 miles away. So far it seems fine. The people are mildly friendly, and have even invited us to a few church/family events. We continued to attend our church in Boulder until our LifeGroup went on hiatus, which was a week ago. I like our LifeGroup, but don't feel like I'm a "part" of it (how's that for vague?). There's too much whispering going on between the other women, and while I'm there, I'm not really included by the women of the group. Although Brian doesn't feel excluded in our LifeGroup, we're both looking at this hiatus as an opportunity to find community elsewhere. We've decided to stay at this church through the summer and see where we land in the fall.

It's interesting and scary all at the same time. Our family life is stable, and we've forged a few friendships in our neighborhood and through Brandon's school. But the Christian community I crave isn't there. It hasn't been there, and I miss it. As a stay-at-home mom, I run the risk of being home by myself unless I make a point of getting out. That gets lonely. Most of the people at this new church live near us. Brandon has already commented that some of the same kids from school are at church. I like the prospect that we could actually live near church friends.

That's where we've landed. We'll see how it goes. We're jumping in right away. I hope the splash is big!