Church Essay #1: The Dance Party

He’s thinking about cheating on his wife.

But he won’t say so here.

It’s not allowed.

In church, we’re not allowed to be human. We’re not allowed to come through the door tired from the week, or struggling with besetting sins. There’s no room on the altar for our shit; it might soil the hand-crocheted doilies.

People ask how we are.

We nod, smile, and tell them we’re fine.

We’re getting our asses kicked by hostile employers, unappreciative wives, unsupportive husbands, and yet, we nod, smile, tell them we’re fine, and move on. That’s the dance.

No one waits to listen to the answer anyway.

People ask how I am.

I tell them I’m dead.

They say, “That’s nice.”

And walk away.

I tell them I’m wrestling.

A plastic smile says, “That’s nice.”

They move on.

I don’t.

I’m still wrestling.

I’m still dead.

No one will bear my burden.

It’s not part of the dance.

No one teaches that step in Sunday School.

I suppose it clashes with the doilies.

* * *
She walks through the church doors and packs away her thoughts of suicide, packs away the pain of a life that didn’t turn out as advertised. She packs it away behind a plastic smile.

People ask how she is.

She lies, because this is church.

Thou shalt not tell the truth.

Thou shalt say thou art fine and move on.

She didn’t always lie. She talked about her daughter’s stalker. She talked about the worthless man she married who walked out on her for a waitress, walked back in when the money ran out, walked out again with borrowed funds she’d never see returned. She talked about the revolving door of her heart, and the burden of not knowing what to do with it.

She told the truth, and the dancers tripped.

She told the truth, and the dancers got angry.

Jill the Tripper.

So, she learned to dance like the rest of them.

Learned to lie.

This is church, after all.

Nod, smile, tell them you’re fine, move on.

Pack your true self behind a plastic yellow smiley mask. Pack your heartache. Pack the lust that knocks on the door. Pack away the sins you’re not supposed to struggle with anymore because you’re saved.

Learn to dance.

Learn to play along.

Learn to lie.

Trip, and they’ll turn on you.

Fall, and you’ll be ostracized.

Show your true colors—toilet brown—and they’ll call you a hypocrite.

* * *
A man stands in the corner. He isn’t wearing a suit. His hair is too long. He looks too thin to be healthy. Even cleaned up and showered he looks grungy. He looks like those prostitutes and drug pushers we talk about bringing to Jesus, but not to church.

Save the sacred hand-crocheted doilies.

He talks with another man, a man in jeans and a Budweiser T-shirt.

They smile at each other. It isn’t plastic. It isn’t natural … here. They smile the way brothers smile, the way neighbors smile, the way love wraps itself around a persons face.

They don’t nod.

They don’t say they’re fine.

They don’t move on.

They stop long enough to share each other’s lives.

They stop long enough to share each other’s burdens.

I join their little group.

They ask how I am.

They wait for the answer.

I tell them.

They listen.

I lay my sickly brown burden on their shoulders.

They bear it with me.

Behind me, the dance continues. Clumsy kindergarten ballerinas cute in their tutus; crashing into each other; dancing for what’s-his-name.

But in our corner, we say words that aren’t allowed. We talk about porn and the struggle of resisting the cute girl in the copy room. We talk about the heartache of life not meeting expectations. We talk about being works in progress, not works perfected.

We promise to pray for each other, and we actually mean it.

We bear each other’s shit.

An eavesdropping dancer trips. We shouldn’t be saying words like that.

A man will have an affair this week.

But we shouldn’t be using words like that.

A woman will stop coming to the dance.

But we shouldn’t be using words like that.

She won’t be missed anyway. Jill the Tripper. Few will hear about the hanging. Fewer still would
believe it.

Christians don’t do that.

Christians don’t say words like that.

Christians, good Christians, dance.

Nod, smile, tell them you’re fine, move on.

Dance on the coffin of hurting souls

Dance to the tune of Nero’s Fiddle.

Dance to show the world that Jesus saves.

We stand in the corner and watch the spectacle. Jesus stands with us, playing a drum. But the dancers continue moving to a different beat.