Episcopal Church Foundation Vestry Papers - for leading congregations

It is not a good day to visit Christ Episcopal Church in downtown Dayton, Ohio. Frigid wind whipsaws around my suburban home. Forecast: more snow, slippery roads. I am sixty-nine years old, the sort of parishioner you’d expect to stay home or simply drive down the street to my familiar pew. Instead, I scrape ice off my windshield and head for the highway. Some journeys won’t wait.

Outside the grand, steepled church a few of us huddle together, passing a sign that reads: We welcome questioning hearts. That’s what I’d heard. That’s why I came. I had amassed a library of soulful theology books that never quite satisfied my gnawing, grumbling mind.

An instant welcome comes from the warm vestibule and the smell of pine branches. To the greeter I babble on about how many local churches, Episcopal and other denominations, I’ve attended in thirty years. She attaches a name tag. Unlike some, I don’t object to this claim ticket. At least for an hour or so, I want to be noticed. Underneath the bulky layers of clothes is a heart stretching out.

In the nave, I recognize no one. Who is included here? Deaf men and women sing hymns along with the signer. A mother patiently strokes the hair of her handicapped adult child. Over the bittersweet sound of a bugle, the lector prays for those who recently died in Iraq and Afghanistan. An usher riding an electric wheelchair passes the collection plate.

We are a varied group, we who have chosen to be in this place. Most importantly, the priest says Christ is here. Not just on Sunday. This is Dayton’s only inner-city church that remains open during the week. Through these doors, Christ, bearing a hundred different names, comes to attend AA and Alanon meetings, and to be fed and comforted by the staff and volunteers of City Heart, the church’s social outreach program.

During the passing of the peace, I hear, “Isn’t our priest amazing? You can get a copy of the sermon in the foyer.” There is excitement about an upcoming class, “Who is My Neighbor?” taught by a well-known New Testament scholar. I learn that many parishioners have traveled even farther than I. In one way or another, they all say, “It’s worth the drive.”

For a first-timer, coffee hour can be a lonely business. But there, waving me over, is the woman who promised to save me a seat. When she learns I’m a retired social worker, she introduces me to the director of City Heart and makes sure my contact information gets to the Hospitality desk. A visit from the priest will soon follow.

Hospitality, it seems to me, starts with an open door, a smile. It is grounded in someone taking the time to discover the gritty, more complicated thing — who exactly is this stranger and why did she make the journey? Archbishop Rowan Williams says a hospitable church should use each person’s “experience, mistakes and false starts — in order to let Christ’s transfiguring love show through.”

After only one visit to this inner-city church, I realized that purpose, genuine and Christworthy, is what I had urgently hoped the new year would bring. Soon, I would again be a newcomer — my first day volunteering at City Heart. Once again, the weather will be freezing, but the journey will seem not so long. A homeless man will guide me through the red doors. “Come on in!” he will say, “This is a great place. They take care of you here!”

Yes, my friend, they do indeed.

A new vestry member at Christ Church, Dayton, Ohio, Peggy Barnes is also a member of the church’s Growth Commission and leads both the Sermon Discussion Group and the Brown Bagger’s Book Club. She earned her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (Bennington College) at age 63 and is a recipient of The Catholic Press Award for Best Fiction of the Year. Peggy is currently working on a memoir: Pauline and Me: A Daughter’s Story of Desertion and Redemption.