Where I attend Mass, there is a foyer separating the sanctuary with stain-glass windows. When I am back there with my toddler– which is often– I can still see the church within, but it’s muddled and distorted through the geometric multi-colored glass. It’s a familiar sight line. It reminds me of my life before baptism when I was intrigued by the Catholic church but peering in as an outsider. I could make out some details, but much was unclear to me, almost incomprehensible. But it also reminds me of how I have felt at times as a Catholic, even of late. Sometimes I want to run, but where else can I go, Lord– you have the words of eternal life. Sometimes, I feel like a weary beggar reaching out along the road. Another hit of that spit and mud poultice, please Jesus– my vision is clouding.
But the good thing about being in that place spiritually is that it brings to mind the many who must feel like that all the time. There are so many Catholics who feel like outsiders. Whether neuro-divergent, or trauma survivors, or mentally ill, they don’t feel like they fit whatever mold a church community is selling. Our human desire for community sometimes means that we get so excited to find like-minded people, that we close in too tightly around one another and move through life like a phalanx. We think we’re keeping out the spears and arrows of our enemies, but who do we lose along the way? Or whom do we fail to see as we close in on ourselves?
Christ in the Gospels is a Healer. We should be a healing Church. We can’t even hide our wounds; one scandal after another proves that. And thank God we can’t hide from the rot. I think the secret sauce to rebuilding our Church is through healing. And that means seeking out the lost, the wounded, and beaten-down even within our own parishes. The outsiders who are looking in through muddled glass need to feel like it’s okay to be wrong, to not fit the mold, to be a bit messy when they step inside the sacred space. They don’t have to be bombarded with the mold and all its rightness. Love them. Be the truth, live the moral high ground instead of preaching it, extend compassion and mercy, and God will do His work. How long will they wait, peering in and wondering if their mess will be welcome? How long before they turn their backs and seek a warm, welcoming people with only half-truths to offer them?
Break the phalanx formation and look around. Attend to the wounded.