As we pulled into the massive Willow Creek Community Church campus, Frances and I tried to figure out the best place to park in case we needed to make a quick exit. We weren’t scared, not really. We just had a long way to go afterwards.
But everything was so streamlined with cones and volunteers that we had no choice but to park with the rest of the crowd, just behind the massive “Dad Fest” picnic area—an area decked out with helicopters, historic cars, RVs for sale, and lots of food stands.
We were an hour early (a time-zone error in our favor), but it was too hot to hide in the car, so we wandered toward what we thought was the main entrance. It wasn’t. But the volunteers let us in, and, upon realizing we were new and lost and interested, one of them, a kindly man I’ll rename Frank offered to show us around the campus.
Willow Creek Community Church is one of the largest mega churches in the country. More than 25,000 people attend each Sunday—at services on the main campus or satellite churches.
We knew this going in.
Frances chitchatted with Frank, telling him about her North Carolina roots and how she had studied this church at a class at Yale. (He was much more impressed by her southern roots than her university, which didn’t seem to ring a bell.) I followed a few steps behind, chiming in occasionally, but mostly trying to take in all the goings-on around me—people chatting in the food court and coffee shop, people scrambling to prepare multiple youth areas, people walking casually under giant screens with announcements about camps and summer programs.
Frank then took us to the Care Center. He proudly showed us the many ministries of the church. This week, the church was showcasing its car program—in which they repair cars donated by church members and give them to single parents. They’d given away 70 this year—and were giving away 30 that day. In addition, the large, fully-equipped garage provided free maintenance work for community members who needed it.
While people waited on their cars, they could also access many other free services in the beautiful center—health, dental, legal, financial, and job-finding. They helped immigrants get papers. They provided clothes and food to people in need. The warehouse was impressively huge and organized. “All of it paid for, too,” he said. “The church doesn’t have any debt.”
We then toured a couple of “small” auditoriums, used for different types of services—the children and youth services and the Spanish service. (These were huge.) Then he took us to the main auditorium, telling us we absolutely had to sit on the front row today. It was a good Sunday. The best sermon he’d heard in thirty years, he said. Ray Lewis was there. And Ken Davis. And the music was the best.
He took our picture, facing the stage, then facing the auditorium, then up close and far away. He handed me back my phone and smiled, truly proud of his church and community—and glad to find us so interested and truly impressed as well.
“Just wait,” he said, joyful at the thought of what we were about to experience. “It’s going to be amazing!” It was endearing.
And sure enough, after a short wait (and after we discreetly retreated to the balcony), the sanctuary filled, the lights dimmed, and a deep voice boomed: “God created the world in six days. And then God created lasers.”
Suddenly, colorful lasers streaked around the room, and a church band began playing the old classic church song …“Mr. Roboto?” “Mr. Roboto” changed into a few other pop hits, including “Staying Alive” and “A Beautiful Day.” The medley ended. The lasers stopped. The congregation cheered. We were confused. It was amazing. It was goofy.
Then we were told to stand. The band began playing a praise song that I didn’t recognize but felt much more comfortable listening to in this context. They put the words on giant screens and the congregation might have been singing along, though it was so loud, it was hard to tell.
The music got softer and more intimate—switching from “praise” (a style of song that refers to God and/or Jesus in the third person) to “worship” (a style that addresses God or Jesus directly, using “you.”)
It culminated with several members of the praise and worship team offering musically underscored prayers about their dads—one thanking God for the wonderful father example that he had to live up to, others asking for strength to deal with their harsh, absent, deceased or sick fathers. The prayers ended, announcements were given by the new lead pastor, Heather Larson, and a pre-recorded Father’s Day video played on the big screens.
When we looked back on stage, Ray Lewis was sitting in a chair on a TV set across from the new lead teaching pastor, Steve Carter, a man ushered in a few months early, Frank had explained, after the founder, Bill Hybels was accused by several women of inappropriate sexual advances. “We don’t really think he did anything really wrong—not like Ted Haggard or Andy Savage,” Frank said, briefly grave, “But he was under a lot of stress and made some bad choices, so it was best for him to leave. It’s a shame because he really made all this what it is.”
I am not a football fan, but I knew Ray Lewis from my time in Baltimore. Mainly I knew that he had also had a rather serious accusation leveled at him—a double homicide. The charge was ultimately adjusted to “obstruction of justice” after Lewis testified against two other men who were allegedly involved in the stabbings. That didn’t come up in the interview. Instead, the focus was on Ray’s childhood; his mother, who taught him his Christian beliefs; his favorite scriptures; his pre-game dance—left for the Father, right for the Son, and down the middle for the Holy Spirit. At the end, the men in the congregation stood, and Ray challenged them to be good fathers, to be fighters, and, in a moment that seemed, perhaps, off-script but was loudly applauded—to bring prayer back into schools as a means to end violence.
And then the chairs were removed and Ken Davis took the stage. Ken Davis was a compelling speaker, full of funny anecdotes that might have been a tad more effective if he himself hadn’t been the good example in each. The message was that fathers should tell their children they love them—and who could argue with that?
He went long. I was antsy and a little bored by the end of it, so we ducked out as soon as he was done—as they continued to make some final announcements. Most likely, they would sing again as well.
Frances liked the sermon. I thought it was too safe. I feel like most of America is in need of strong leadership. He had been given a platform. Couldn’t he push the message of love—a message that used John 13:34 as a scriptural basis, a little further?
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”
Here he is, with thousands of people watching, with a chance to preach about the radical love of Jesus to a congregation that has demonstrated, through its commitment to a Care Center and to their own community, that they have the capacity to love their neighbors. Meanwhile, the Justice Department is separating families at the border, our country is dividing, people are operating on fear and believing the worst about outsiders of all sorts.
Shouldn’t all of us be challenged beyond telling our children and our fathers that we love them? Shouldn’t we be challenged to be truly brave and love as Jesus loved?
But that’s easy for me to say.
After Frank took our picture, just before service started, I piped up: “Could you tell me where the bathroom is?”
Frank offered to walk me there while Frances held our seats. On our way, we ran into another volunteer and Frank introduced us. “This is Emily, from South Carolina. She’s here with …your friend?” he asked.
Frances and I got married two weeks ago, and I’m still in that stage where I can’t help but smile every time I call her my wife. (That stage is likely to last indefinitely.) And this set up couldn’t have been better. We had had a great tour. I think we’d all truly enjoyed one another and connected over our love for community and fiscal responsibility. I had a great opportunity to be open and give someone I didn’t know the benefit of the doubt. But instead, I said, “Uh. Yeah.”
“Her friend, Frances. They are going to sit on the front row.”
“That’s nice,” said the other volunteer.
I quickly thanked Frank and went to the bathroom.
I don’t know why I couldn’t say, “She’s my wife.”
Nothing bad would have happened if I’d been honest. True, the church, as a whole, is not supportive of gay marriage. They wouldn’t make me a cake. Illinois is right next to my actual home state of Missouri, where our new governor, a man from my small hometown of Bolivar, referred to us as “those people” as he expressed support for the recent Supreme Court decision. On this particular Sunday, I was wearing sundress and earring camouflage, so I might not have seemed so “those people-y” to the church congregation, but if we had identified ourselves from the start—not as Southerners or Yale students but as married–we would have been outsiders. Still, even a worst case scenario wouldn’t have been dangerous. Maybe he’d pray for me or invite me to the special class for those “struggling with homosexuality.” Nothing I shouldn’t have been able to gracefully handle.
But, in that small moment, I didn’t do it.
I believe or, at least, I desperately want to believe that when we confront one another as humans and not as “those people”—when we give ourselves just the smallest chance to find out what motivates people and how they think—we find have more in common than we have different. We find ways to connect and love. It’s not that I expect a conversation with Frances and me is going to immediately change what I (possibly wrongly) assume is Frank’s opinion about gay marriage—but it would mean that he would have two more real people to think about as he continues to grapple with his interpretations and beliefs.
I believe, or desperately want to believe, that the reason this nice man overlooks the accusations of the women of his church about his former pastor and is willing to unquestioningly hear the testimony of a football player accused of murder is because he sees his Bill Hybels and Ray Lewis as forgivably human. I believe, or desperately want to believe, that the reason the members of the church who support a ministry to help immigrants in their community get papers and yet attend rallies for a man who enforces zero tolerance immigration policies that separate families is that they see the immigrants in their home communities and church as fellow humans. I believe, or desperately want to believe, that Frank would have been a little surprised but kind when he learned that we were more than friends because he had just spent forty-five minutes talking with us.
But of course, to the women who accused the pastor—a truly brave act–Frank’s attitude feels incredibly dehumanizing. To the families of the victims of the stabbings, who have never had anyone convicted for the deaths of their relatives, it must feel infuriating that this church congregation will stand and cheer with Ray Lewis. For the immigrant families the church helps, it must feel confusing that the same people will attend rallies for a man who is cruel to other families in similar situations. For a gay couple, it is hard to hear a church preach love from the pulpit and fight it in court. It’s hard to be sent to correctional Sunday School for a “sin” that is the best thing that’s happened to them. It’s hard not to retreat to Brooklyn and scream on Facebook, “I’m not struggling with homosexuality! I’m struggling with heteronormativity…”I guess that’s why I couldn’t do it. I had a foot out the door even before I walked in Entrance F. It’s not that I was really scared. But, for all of the reasons above, I still had a hard time trusting, well, those people.
There is such a capacity in all of people to connect, understand, empathize, forgive, and love. But in order to do so, we have to stop “those people-ing” people. In John 13:34, Jesus wasn’t telling fathers to say “I love you” to their children. (In fact, there was something in another gospel about hating your father, if I recall.) Jesus was preaching something more daring. He said to bless those who persecute you, to love your enemies. He was telling gay people to give their evangelical tour guides the benefit of the doubt and to be honest, open, and kind. He was telling Republicans to give immigrants the benefit of the doubt and to be generous, open, and kind. The evangelical movement that led to this church was started not by conservatives in suits and appropriately long skirts but by hippies who were drawn to this message of radical love. Radical love means struggling–even when it is uncomfortable, even when it seems impossible, even when it fails–to connect. It doesn’t matter who is right or who is wrong. Radical love is brave, not judgmental. Radical love is less a belief and more a choice that has to be made constantly.
“I told him you were my friend,” I confessed to Frances.
“What? Really? Why?”
“I don’t know. It caught me off-guard. You’d been doing most of the talking…Ugh. I wimped out. I had the perfect moment, and I wimped out.”
“It’s scary.”
“You would have done it.”
“I was preparing myself the whole time, though. You’ll do it next time.”
“I hope so.”
I will definitely keep trying. I will keep asking myself the question, “What would I do if I were brave?” And then I will try to do it. I think I get stronger, even when I fail. So I have hope for next time.
“Well,” said Frances, trying to think of a way to comfort me. “They’re giving away free bacon donuts over there. You want one?”
I did not, but I took one, and it was frustratingly good.
“You think they’d let us have these if they knew we were gay?”
“Well. Yeah, I do.”
