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friendship

Theology

ignoring friendship is destroying the Church

I’ve been mulling over a few thoughts for the past few months, and they all sort of came to a head last night. Suddenly things that didn’t seem to be connected fit together to create one compelling conclusion: the Christian obsession with marriage and family (read: traditional, nuclear) is destroying the Church and her people.

A bit ago I was a part of a discussion group to help a group of pastors who wanted to make sure they created a safe space for LGBT+ people, regardless of whether or not they identified as Side A or Side B. One of the things that was emphasized over the course of the discussion was the absolute need for married-couples centrism to end. Most of the churches I’ve been in don’t know what to do with unmarried people, especially once those people reach 30.

Church is supposed to be a community, but many churches have adopted this mentality of segregating everything up by “life stage” and gender– see Ladies’ Bible Studies and Men’s Prayer Breakfasts and the endless barrage of things for married people to do. At the last church we attended, the church set up a “Dinners for 8” program so married couples of similar ages could get to know each other. They didn’t offer anything similar for single people.

Over time it began to deeply bother me that conservative evangelicals want to shove celibacy down every queer person’s throat, but offer nothing for them. No sense of community, of belonging. Nothing to help strengthen or comfort, or help them get by in a world where they’re forbidden from being with anyone they love. “If you’re gay, then you need to remain celibate,” is the message, but then they just boost them out into the cold dark night of loneliness with a swift kick to the rear.

Another thing that seemed unrelated at first is my beef with the phrase “emotional adultery.” All of us, but most especially married people, are cautioned from basically every side to avoid “close emotional connections with the opposite sex.” This completely ignores non-binary people, who have no “opposite sex,” and bisexual people, because the idea is that we should avoid friendships with the gender we’re attracted to, and bi people are attracted to all genders. It’s also heteronormative, but affects lesbian and gay individuals differently.

Aside from the fact that this “avoid emotional adultery!” teaching is tantamount to “have no friends!” for bi people, it also makes it seem anathema for straight people to have friendships with someone of the same gender– a position that seems completely unsupported in the Bible, what with everyone thinking of each other as brother and sister and having all things in common and hanging out together all the time and greeting each other with holy kisses.

And the last thing was a eureka! moment I had last night: I have never, not once, heard a message on the topic “this is how you can have a good friendship.” Oh, I’ve heard plenty about avoiding people who would “corrupt your good manners” and lots of messages on how “iron sharpeneth iron,” but nothing that covers things like friendships require healthy boundaries or friends should communicate about their needs.

Instead, what we get is lots and lots and LOTS of messages on being a good husband or wife, on the importance of marriage and family, and a fairly basic human need like friendship is completely shoved aside in favor of the Idol of the Nuclear Family. This obsession has wreaked violence and harm in the form of homophobia and anti-marriage-equality bigotry, but it’s also destroyed the Church because we’ve collectively decided that being a community of friends is less important than worshiping a false idol.

One of the things that has always made me wistful and left me longing are the descriptions of the early church in Acts. They cared about each other, helped each other, and it didn’t matter if your family was close by, or if you still had parents living, or if your husband was dead. They thought of each other as individuals, as friends, as community, not as a loosely organized structure of Family Units. You weren’t important to them only as long as you had 2.5 kids, a picket fence, and a dog– being a person created with the Imago Dei was more than enough.

I think the modern American church desperately needs to get back to that. We’ve been so obsessed with “One Man, One Woman” for so many years that it’s made us blind to our basic human needs. We can’t afford to ignore friendship. Without it, we the Church are as clanging brass. The sound of the fury, signifying nothing. If we can’t even offer friendship, what else is there?

Photo by Jeff Golden
September 11, 2015 by
Social Issues

iron sharpeneth iron, part two

irons

Growing up, I received some very specific messages about relationships and friendships. For many Christians, evangelicals in particular, who you choose for your friends is one of the most important decisions you’ll make in life. Aside from the idea that men and women are not allowed to be friends (which is so large a concept it’s almost a completely separate issue), we’re given a set of guidelines for how we initiate and structure all of our friendships.

One of the very first principles that we’re given is that while it’s ok to be friends with people who are “in the world,” or “non-Christians,” we’re not supposed to form deep attachments to them. This idea springs from verses like “A righteous man is cautious in friendship, but the way of the wicked leads them astray” (Pro. 12:26). The “wicked,” here, is not referring to truly wicked people, actually. “Wicked” people, in Christian parlance, are the unsaved, the non-elect. It’s not possible for us to form deep bonds with unregenerate people, and, if we do, the only thing that can happen is for the “wicked” to drag us down.

We’re given many metaphors to explain this idea– a rotten apple ruins the whole bunch, you can’t put clean water in muddy water to make the muddy water clean . . .

What this does, however, is set up a false dichotomy for us: Christians are completely unlike “non-Christians,” so much so that just associating with “them” can cause our downfall. We’re better than they are. Oh, I’m positive hardly anyone would actually say that, but, sadly, it’s what they mean. We’re more moral, more upstanding, have higher standards, better goals, and throwing a “non-Christian” into our attempts to be “holy” can only cause us problems.

This leaves us with only one purpose for interacting with “non-Christians”: evangelization. Sometimes we’re encouraged to be quite overt about this, but, most of the time, we’re just told to have a “shining testimony” in front of our non-Christian friends. And that . . . leads to problems, in my experience. Because then you wind up with self-righteous teenagers who think that adhering to the party line is what a “testimony” is. Defend your faith! we’re ordered, but, most of the time, all that looks like is defending our parent’s politics.

After we make sure we’re not fraternizing with the enemy too much– just enough to make sure they know we’re better than them see our testimony– what are we supposed to do with our friends who are Christians?

The basic, guiding, principle behind most Christian friendships is the concept of “iron sharpeneth iron.” That’s our purpose in friendship. Sometimes this is described as “edification.” We’re supposed to do all we can to help our brothers and sisters in Christ become better Christians. We’re to help each other stay on the straight and narrow, and, if we see someone straying from the path of righteousness? Well, “Open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend” (Pro. 27:5-6) or “Two are better than one . . . For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow” (Ecc. 4:9).

But, what I’ve experienced, and what I heard from many of you yesterday, is what this mentality frequently leads to is all of us watching each other like hawks. We start wondering who’s going to slip up next? We start looking for things like “besetting sins” in each other. We offer ourselves as “accountability partners.” In the end, we do everything within our power to maintain the system.

A reader, David, wrote a comment yesterday that I thought made an excellent point:

Part of the issue is that within Christian circles there always seems to be an ulterior motive, not just in terms of friendships but in general. You’re not a friend for the sake of being a friend but because Jesus wants it. You’re not feeding the poor because they need feeding but because it gets you Jesus points. You’re hugging that person because it’s what one does not because you want to hug them. The subversion of social motivations is insidious and so damaging.

And, I have to say, I agree with him. There’s a level of superficiality in most Christian relationships that I think is baffling. Which, I’m not saying that only Christians have superficial relationships, that’s not true at all, but it’s surprising to me that a group of people who are told “they shall know you by how you love one another,” aren’t known for that at all. We’re supposed to be striving for deeper, more meaningful relationships. Friendships where the overwhelming characterestic is love.

I haven’t gotten a whole lot of love from most of my Christian friends.

Condemnation, sure.

Constant admonishments to toe the Christian line, absolutely.

But love? That’s scarce.

For many Christians, however, the two are conflated. Condemnation is love. Accusations are loving.

I’ve had this idea explained to me, on more than on occasion, as “The Poisonous Cookie.” Your friend sees a plate full of cookies, and they look absolutely delectable– all warm and soft and melted chocolate. They decide that they want one, but at the last second before the take the first bite, you snatch it out of their hand. Initially, they’re extremely frustrated with you. “Why would you do something like that?!” But then you explain: you saw the butler put poison on the cookies. If they’d eaten the cookie, they would have died. And, voila, suddenly they’re eternally grateful.

Because, as a Christian, you wouldn’t let someone you cared about do something you know is bad for them, right? The best thing for them is to have a “good relationship with Jesus,” and you have to keep them away from the poison cookies– which could be “sin,” but is frequently “anything that doesn’t conform to our rigid standards for Christian behavior which may or may not have “biblical” backing.”

We’re not really taught what it means to be someone’s friend. We are given messages about love and understanding and “beams and motes” and don’t be judgmental, but it all gets overridden in the flood of be as judgmental as possible.

August 21, 2013 by
Social Issues

iron sharpeneth iron, part one

irons

“I’m really worried about her.”

I was laying in my bed, staring up at my ceiling, envisioning all the different situations one of my dearest friends could find herself in, now that she was living in the downtown of a big city, far away from people she knew and the community she’d grown up in. Handsome was on the phone, listening to my concerns.

“Why? She’s a grown-ass woman. There’s nothing for you to worry about.”

“Well… I’m just worried that she’s away, and so busy, and the only relationships she’s forming are with people that she works with.”

“So?”

That question made me pause. I wasn’t entirely sure what he meant by so? This was a straightforward concept, at least to me, and he didn’t seem to understand my concerns at all. Which puzzled me, and I wasn’t sure how I could explain what was, to me, a foundational idea about relationships. I was running into conversations like this one with Handsome more and more often– concepts I’d lived with all my life, that I had accepted as normal, seemed completely foreign to him.

“I… well, I mean, hanging out with non-Christians is fine, but it seems like it’s more difficult. You need Christian friends, too. So they can help you.”

“I don’t understand, Sam. None of my friends growing up were Christians, and I think I turned out just fine.”

That stopped me in my tracks. “Really?”

“Yeah. All my friends were Muslim or Sikh or non-religious. I knew a few people who were Orthodox, but yeah, all my close friends weren’t Christians.”

This was a complete about-face from anything I’d previously been given about the nature of friendship. I fell silent as I struggled to process what Handsome had just handed me– it felt like a deluge, like being thrown into a river and I couldn’t quite tell which way was up.

“Anyway, I don’t think you have anything to be worried about. She’ll be fine.”

We talked for a few minutes longer, but when we hung up, I didn’t move. I continued staring up at the ceiling, recalling past relationships, past friendships I’d had. I realized that I had always assumed that being a Christian made you a better friend, and even through all of my struggles with God and religion and faith, even when I’d lost my faith completely, it was such a deeply held belief that I never even bothered re-thinking it. But, suddenly, I could almost taste how ridiculous the idea was. Nothing about being a Christian makes anything about me intrinsically better than any other human being on the planet. But that was what I’d believed– I’d believed that having Christian friends was better. To an extent, I’d believed that having “non-Christian” friends was almost a waste of time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I was nervous. More nervous than I’d been on my first day of class– more nervous than during my freshman piano audition, even. Philip* had approached me during choir practice and asked if we could go to dinner together after church– just the two of us. I was confused by this, especially since Philip earnestly believed in never being alone with a girl, so whatever it was he was thinking, it was serious. I had accepted, and here I was, sitting at the cafeteria table, waiting for him to get through the line and join me. I arranged the potato chips on my plate, fiddled with  my silverware, wiped the condensation off my glass.

I jumped when he appeared, and my heart started beating harder as he took his seat. He said grace, and he dug in while I picked at my tuna sandwich. Eventually, after a horrendously long attempt at small talk, he brought up why he’d asked me to dinner.

“I’m worried about you.”

I didn’t say anything, knowing he’d explain without prompting. I couldn’t even look at him.

“Why have you abandoned all of us?”

I didn’t know how to answer him. Being honest– if he even believed me, it would not be well-received. “I’m just not comfortable hanging out with you guys any more.” I could feel my promise to myself wavering. I’d sworn I wasn’t going to get pulled back into the politics of it all. The backstabbing, the gossip, the lies and manipulation. I was done. I was leaving.

“Why not?” He was careful to keep his voice calm, soothing.

“I just don’t get along with . . . people.”

“Sarah*.” The one word was an accusation. I expected him to know; the problems between me and Sarah had long become obvious to pretty much everyone.

“You’re both being utterly ridiculous.”

That made me look up, look him in the eye. “What do you mean?”

“You two. You’re both squabbling over something that isn’t even your decision to make. It’s mine.”

I cringed. He’d caught on to that. Finally. “I’m not squabbling with her over you, Philip. I could care less.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I don’t believe you.”

“No, honestly. I don’t care. I’m your friend, and that’s it. I don’t want anything more than that. I’m not interested in anything more than that.”

He leaned back his chair, crossing his arms. It was a gesture I knew well. “Then why have you been constantly fighting with her over me?”

I sighed, exasperated. “I don’t like you. But she does, and I think she thinks that I do, too, and so… well, I’m a threat. And she’s been manipulating all of us, and I’m sick of it. I’m not interested in participating anymore. I’ve tried to talk to her about it, but it did no good. So I’m done. It’s pointless, and stupid, and it sucks.”

“I think you should stay.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s your obligation to. We’re friends, and that means that we’re supposed to help each other. Iron sharpeneth iron. You can’t just abandon your friends when you don’t like what they’re doing. You have to help them grow.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Hey, you think I could try on your scarf? It’s so fluffy!”

I turned from the pool table, grateful for a momentary distraction. I was terrible at pool. I was losing, embarrassingly, to Michael*, who had already imbibed six bears, half a bottle of rum, and a few shots of . . . something that smelled a bit like gasoline. When I saw who had just asked me that, I laughed. “Sure. Absolutely.”

A few minutes later, after Michael had completely stomped all over my terrible billiard-playing abilities, I walked over to introduce myself, and we ended up chatting for a few minutes.

“Hey, you want to catch a smoke?”

“A– what?”

“Do you smoke?”

“Uhm . . . no.”

“Cool. Mind if we go outside while I smoke?”

I shrugged. “Sure.”

We stepped out onto the rickety porch and joined a few others who had stepped out of the crowded entryway and living room to get some air or to smoke. Someone I didn’t know launched in to what seemed to be a familiar speech, describing all the benefits of “whole leaf” cigarettes. I got handed one, and in lieu of lighting it on fire and sticking it in my mouth, I sniffed it. “It smells like tea!” my surprised outburst interrupted the flow of conversation. Initially, I was embarrassed. I never knew how to handle myself when I’d inadvertently grabbed attention.

But everyone just laughed. “Of course it does. Awesome, isn’t it?”

And they moved on.

No admonishments about not interrupting people.

No gentle reminders to let everyone take their turn in the conversation.

Nothing.

I looked around at the group of people I’d found myself in– I wasn’t entirely sure how I had ended up here, at this party. But it was the first place I’d ever been where I felt like I could belong. A stranger, someone hardly anyone here had even met before. The shy, nervous little girl who didn’t know how to play pool, didn’t drink, didn’t smoke, didn’t talk– and when I did talk, it was random outbursts that didn’t fit. The woman standing in the corner nervously fidgeting, obviously desperate to fit in, to be cool. They could see right through it– but they didn’t care.

It didn’t matter where I’d come from, who I was, where I’d been, what I believed, where I went to church, if I went to church. None of it. I was a person. And that was enough.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As I lay on my bed that day, my conversation with Handsome over, staring up at my ceiling, I realized something.

By and large, my relationships with regular church-attending evangelicals (with a few notable exceptions, my best friends among them) have been extremely toxic and unhealthy.  It took me having friendships with men and woman who had never been Christians, who had grown up Christian but were now agnostic, who were still Christian but would be described as “nominal” or “backslidden” by anyone I’d grown up with, to experience friendship. Real, honest, loving, friendship.

I don’t think Christian culture really knows the meaning of the word.

August 20, 2013 by
Social Issues

the importance of being a safe harbor

harbor

I emerged from the student affairs office, exhausted, wrung out, and battling my desperate need to curl up into a ball and cry. The conversation I’d just been forced to have had been so invasive, so demanding, so controlling that it had left me feeling battered. Everything inside of me was telling me to find a corner somewhere and hide until it was safe to come out again, but I didn’t know where to go. Nowhere on that campus felt safe– it was like I could feel people staring at me around corners, and I had to fight against the urge to constantly check over my shoulder.

When I got out into the hallway, thanking my lucky stars that it was between classes so the hallways were empty, I ran into Andrew*.

During the course of my three-year relationship and engagement with John*, my rapist, I had lost most of my friends. In what had been, at the time, “my own decision,” I had cut myself off from almost all of my friends for one reason or another. By the time I finally and mercifully escaped that relationship, I realized that losing my friends had not been my decision at all– I’d done it because John had told me to, and that was it. He had felt threatened by the friends who were willing to tell me the truth about what they were seeing.

Andrew, for some reason, was an exception. It’s not that John hadn’t felt threatened by him– because he had. He had forbidden me from talking with him, and I actually had. I’d cut off all contact with him whatsoever. Refused to even look at him when I passed him on the sidewalk, or in church, or in the cafeteria.

But that day, after John had broken our engagement and I’d been dragged into student affairs more than once and it felt like I was reaching my breaking point, Andrew was there, in the hallway. He didn’t say a word. He took one look at my face, and he hugged me.

For a moment, I was frightened– what was he doing? He knew physical contact between genders was against the rules!

But that lasted for a microsecond. In an instant, I went from terror, to devastation, to the simple knowledge that I needed that embrace more than I needed air to breathe. I needed him to not say anything, to not offer me advice, or a word of comfort, or a solution, or a way to fix me so I’d feel better. I needed him, as a friend, to hold me, and give me a place where I could exist for a single moment in safety.

Over the next few weeks, Andrew continued being that safe place.

He never asked questions.

He never gave me any words of wisdom on how to deal with a breakup.

He never tried to help me.

He was just . . . my friend.

And it didn’t matter that I hadn’t spoken to him in well over a year. It didn’t matter how I’d treated him, how I’d slighted him. He was there, and that was what I needed in one of the darkest times of my life. In the few months it took to repair some of the damage wreaked on my other friendships, he got me through it by taking me to dinner with his group, by making church less miserable, by shielding me from John when he tried to verbally attack me in public. He never pried into some of the things he’d known or witnessed, he never took me to task for the things I’d done while being controlled by an abusive manipulator. He knew he didn’t need to understand anything, or to know anything, to support me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That was over three years ago, and it’s taken me that long to realize the importance of being a safe place for someone, a harbor they can come to in order to escape a storm.

The compulsion to help is a strong one, but very often, our definition of help is not helpful at all. Because we see help as only being helpful when there’s a concrete, evidential improvement in the circumstances of someone’s life. So, we give advice, and believe that if our friend takes it, their circumstances will improve. Or we give money. Or a thousand other things that we do in an effort to truly help.

And we forget that sometimes, none of that is important.

Sometimes, all a person needs is a respite. It could look like not saying anything, or completely ignoring the problem, whiling away the time in productive things, or non-productive things. It means asking the question “what do you need?” and then listening for the response. It means not sticking our oar into a problem that we are not capable of understanding, because we are not our friend.

Sometimes, all our friend needs is a place to come to where they’re not going to be hammered with constant interrogations into their motives and reasoning. A place where they can come and have their agency as an adult recognized. A place where they are not demeaned, but respected as someone capable of making their own decisions. A place where they can be empowered and strengthened in their autonomy, a place where someone they care about cares about them, and not the fabrication of who they “should” be.

May 24, 2013 by