Sunday Morning Vegetables

I’m on the hunt for a church community.

I can’t in good conscience identify church as a need anymore. Just shy of two years into this pandemic and I recognize that learning, worshiping, seeking justice, and building community with the same group of people, and then weathering disagreements with those people with grace isn’t something a whole lot of us can claim we have regular access to.

But a longing to seek?

A vision worth hoping for?

I miss church the way a fourth-grader misses Friday Pizza Night after her mom has gone on a health kick. “Remember when we used to get pepperoni pizza every week and then we would watch a movie together? REMEMBER!”

Some days, I wonder if rather than continuing to hunt for my elusive prey, it’s better to just embrace that I’m now religiously vegetarian.

Faith is a high-fiber experience of thoughtful books, intentional self-practice, angsty but honest conversation with fellow vegetarians, and straight-up Scripture when I can stomach it.

It’s not expressive and it’s not sumptuous. It’s sustaining.

I really could take or leave the church rhythms themselves, but the way that kind of shared experience could usher me into an awareness of God’s presence, that is what I miss most. I don’t feel close to the current of what God is about in the world. And I want to.

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Katy (Johnson) Stafford dreams, writes, and occasionally podcasts in the messy middle of life. Newly married, Katy is spending her 30s embracing hope, longing, and the wild spaces in her own heart. Her favorite creative project right now is called In Love, a memoir about loving your life beyond white picket fences. Occasionally, she also shares her thoughts here.