To my friends,
Many of you will not understand this next step in my journey. You may already be confused or troubled by what I have been saying in recent weeks.
The purpose of this letter is both to inform and to request.
First, I want to let you know of my intention to create healing space for those who carry deep wounds from the church.
Second, I am closing my Living in Uncertainty Facebook Page and will instead be posting directly to my personal Facebook profile.
Though my beliefs, convictions, and understandings are always on an unending journey of learning and growing, what may seem like a startling change is in fact in alignment with who I have always been.
What I have not always been is free.
I do feel free now. Not free to harm, but free to speak. Free to tell my story and free to offer space for healing.
I also want you to know I am not angry at any specific people or any specific churches. Neither do I blame any particular people for my experiences. It is my firm belief people do the best they can, so it is my intention to drag no particular persons nor churches through the mud in the process of offering healing space. I believe there is good in the church and have experienced much of that goodness for myself. There is a sad reality, however, that many people carry deep wounds from the church, and these wounds do not often receive the necessary care and tending needed to heal.
People who carry wounds from the church occupy a variety of spaces. Some have left the church entirely, with no intention of ever returning. Some have moved to a church where they feel free to be themselves. Some have one foot out the door of their current church. And some are faithful members of their church despite their woundings.
Some are fully aware of the pain the church has inflicted. Some are only vaguely aware of how the church has harmed them. Others, while wounded are completely unaware of the church’s involvement in their pain.
For some, the wounds are inflicted with few sharp blows. For others, the infliction is chronic, delivered steadily throughout the course of many years.
For those of you who carry any such wounds, I hope you will find my feeble offerings healing and encouraging. Even though I still consider myself a Christian person, please know it is neither my goal nor my intention to lead anyone back to church or Christian faith. My hope is simply to be of service in offering healing spaces which may unite you to your own inner wisdom and help you find peace.
For those of you who are a part of the church and do not have this experience of wounding, it is my hope that you will listen, for it is in listening and hearing one another that empathy, healing, freedom, and peace become possible.
May the brokenness of our lives always be repaired with gold,
Jen
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