Leaving Church - Barbara Brown Taylor [47]
Because I did not stay at Grace-Calvary long enough for me or anyone else to resolve my departure at a feeling level, most of the ambivalence about my resignation was funneled into my going-away party. It was a hasty affair, held in the parish hall on a weeknight near the end of September. Enough people came to save me from embarrassment. After some kind words by those with whom I had shared leadership, I was presented with a ceramic soup tureen in the shape of a giant orange pumpkin. Since Thanksgiving was just around the corner, I took that to be what the gift symbolized: gratitude for the five and a half years that I had spent at Grace-Calvary. But the Cinderella in me detected another message that seemed more to the point. Wherever that congregation and I had been going together, our royal carriage had turned back into a pumpkin. The clock had struck midnight, and it was time for me to go.
Or was that just my exit strategy? Looking around the parish hall that night, I was struck hard by all that I was leaving behind. In that one room, I had welcomed dozens of new members, introducing them to the intricacies of Anglican history and theology. I had said prayers at the wakes of those who had died, sung Christmas carols around the old upright piano that needed tuning, and eaten pounds of chicken casseroles at covered dish suppers. Suzanne was there that night, back from her Peace Corps placement in North Africa with a lovely silver bracelet on her arm. The women in her village had given it to her, she said when I admired it. Bing and Maggie were there, smelling faintly of the Chihuahuas who were the children of their old age. Bob and John were there, who had helped site my house before the foundation was dug, and Eleanor, who volunteered early on to be my “other mother” whenever I needed one.
There were so many people in that room whom I had committed to love over the past five and a half years. I might see them again at the grocery store or the post office, but when that happened we would both register the fact that I was no longer their pastor. Standing there with my pumpkin, I forgot why leaving church had ever seemed a welcome prospect to me. I kept the doors of my heart cracked open as speeches were made and more gifts were presented. Then, at the point in the ceremony when the departing rector is supposed to give the keys to the church back to the senior warden, I handed Jerrell the wooden doorstop that had been presented to me when I arrived at Grace-Calvary. “Keep the doors of this church open to all people,” read the little brass plaque on the flat end of the wedge. Once I saw it safely in Jerrell’s hand, there was nothing to hold the doors of my heart open any longer. They swung shut with a click, so that I was able to say good-bye without weeping to everyone who stood in line.
When they had all gone, I gathered up my things. In addition to the pumpkin, there was a Piedmont College T-shirt, a handful of cards, and a white paper towel with something hard inside. When I picked it up, Suzanne’s silver bracelet fell into my hand. I slipped the bright bangle over the worn cuff of my clergy shirt, where I never wore anything more daring than a Timex watch. Then I turned off the light and stepped into the night. As I did, I heard the familiar honking over my head. Through the pines I could not see the wild geese any better than they could see me, but I took their presence as a blessing. I too was on the move without a map. I too was traveling on pure