Real Families: Meditations on family life

Ihad a dream in which I was responsible for setting up a grand party. I don’t normally do this in my waking life—I am not particularly gifted at hosting, and I am something of an introvert. I don’t go to many parties, much less throw them. As I expect I would in real life, in the dream I was anxious and agitated. In the midst of my anxious preparations, someone called over to me, “Your table is ready.” And it was. A perfectly appointed, beautiful table, ready for guests. What a relief; I didn’t have to do it alone.

I grew up in a church I’ve heard folks describe as inner city; actually it is on the edge of the city, right on the boundary of my city and a suburb. But I suppose people are correct when they describe the psyche and energy of that little area; it certainly has some of the problems, joys, hurts and issues of the inner city. However, that description always sounded jarring to me because I grew up there, and what I remember most about that area is the amount of green space and trees in the neighborhood. Across the street from the church was a big park. The neighborhood I lived in was just adjacent to the church; traveling by car or by bus would take 15-20 minutes to drive there. My neighborhood was six little streets bounded on three sides by woods and on the fourth by railroad tracks. There was one way in and one way out for vehicles.

One could walk to the church in about the same amount of time it took to drive, but you got to go through delicious woods to get there, passing over a stream that had tadpoles in the springtime, then up a hill and over a well-worn path that had a section with great bumps for those riding bikes. The woods stretching out in other directions were just as fine—blackberry bushes, other streams and a meadow, trees so thick in some places that you could pretend you were in a deep, dark forest. In those days, children still spent long summer days traversing the neighborhood, going from house to house, playing indoors and outdoors, running about through the streets and in the woods, making sure to be home by the time the streetlights were on. So inner city doesn’t quite compute in my ears, but I guess that’s what other people saw.

This church of mine, founded in the late 1950s, was the bedrock foundation of my commitment to antiracism and the place where my peacemaking spirituality was nurtured. But such fancy terms were not used. It was simply church, but a different kind of church—one that from its roots was founded on the principles of integration, as opposed to the presumed segregation of most churches in the city and in the nation. This church was intentionally, from the beginning, a church “where black and white blend in Christ”—the slogan on the church sign and on the front of our weekly bulletins for most of my childhood.

My spiritual development happened in the context of a racially mixed group of people who were intentional about being church together during a period when actions were unusual, seemed impossible or at least foolish, and members of the church were told so. In my other contexts (school, for instance), the fact that I attended a church with a white pastor was just plain weird, and some questioned whether or not I really had “church” at my church. For those of us who grew up in the congregation, this place was home, and home became the standard by which we judged other worshipping communities.

Indeed, for many of us it became the standard by which we judged white people. This may or may not have been fair, but I have always considered whether or not white Christians were willing to worship with black Christians and not have to change everything to the white way a measure of their authenticity. Willingness to learn is included in this.

It was not only that our church was willing to walk the unknown waters of interracial relationship on a person-to-person, family-to-family basis—members of the church community also addressed the dismantling of systemic racism. Here Anabaptist/Mennonite peace and justice theological concerns met the liberation and justice focus of black theology. Although many years have passed since my childhood, I continue to find co-travelers on this journey. I’m grateful for the many people and places that formed my comrades.

In this place, my home church, the table was set for me, and I was served the richest of fare. I ate well and grew strong. As I try to set the same kind of table for others, I’m delighted to discover over and over again that I’m not expected to do it alone.

Regina Shands Stoltzfus is working on a doctorate in theology and ethics at Chicago Theological Seminary. The congregation she refers to is Lee Heights Community Church in Cleveland.