Dear Church

We invited readers who have left a church or whose church left a conference to send a short letter to those who remain. We asked people to be constructive. Still, some may be hard to read. We invite you to read the letters below not as attacks but as honest attempts to describe an often-painful experience. Not all of the letters are from the Mennonite Church Canada context.

Dear Church,

Placating is not peacemaking. When you bend and conform to the loudest, most toxic person in the room in order to prevent conflict or make waves, you are not a peacemaker. I repeat: placating is not peacemaking.

Dear Church,

We would be gone if the children’s program didn’t work for our child. I’m done with constant, cynical deconstruction of the faith. It does nothing for my soul or active faith. I also find it troubling how uncool it is to be straight right now if you’re a youth. I know that might make some people angry or hurt but the numbers are so high that I have to wonder whether, for some, this is an unhealthy fad. The bigger issue is the constant deconstruction and exceptionalism, the belief that our church knows better than all others.

Dear Church,

What I want you to know is that although I left you, I wasn't mad at you or disappointed or anything. Some of my friends feel that you have wronged them, and that’s valid. But for me, it’s just that we have grown apart. Thank you for the happy home you provided and for the role you played in helping me develop a social conscience. I am grateful that even though we believe in different things and even though I was the one who left, you always welcome me when I walk through your doors.

Dear Church,

I will no longer be part of a group that spends energy parsing who belongs based on white, male, capitalist, middle class, heterosexual interpretations of Scripture while the world literally burns. I cease to be a member of a church that only gives lip service to reconciliation with Indigenous peoples. I sever my relationship to a church that invests denominational funds in the greatest fossil fuel extraction-enabling Canadian bank. 

Dear Church,

I want you to know that I tried really hard. I signed up and said yes whenever you asked. But I got ahead of you. I read more, talked more, listened more to fresh, new whispers of our Creator. I kept waiting for you and circling back to see that you were still in line. Then, one day, during the pandemic, you had run back to your old house. I guess you feel safer there. But I don't. I can't go back to that. I'll keep looking over my shoulder, but I am not circling back anymore. I can't. It's not healthy.

Dear Church,

When a condition of membership was abstinence from alcohol, it was too much. It would not have been onerous, but neither would I have been more holy. When the singles Sunday school class was more about meeting someone and becoming family, it was too much. When my questions, thoughts and feelings were ignored, and I was told what to think and feel, it was too much. When Jesus was enough for everything—replacing therapy, organization, planning, discussion, listening—that was too much.

Dear Church,

We have our feet mostly out, having withdrawn membership about a decade ago. Our reasons are complex. 1.) The callous way the church treated our daughter.  2.) The further we moved from the organized church, the more evidence we saw of the Sermon of the Mount. 3.)  An examination of church history, Mennonite and other, that revealed significant manipulation of circumstances to consolidate power, wealth and guilt, often with shame as the tool. 4.)  A general sense that the church is built on a house of cards. We have dear friends in the Mennonite church. We have not completely turned our backs. We even volunteer as meal servers at funerals.

Dear Church,

You’ve lost your way. Your services are now productions with carefully constructed set lists and schedules designed to evoke particular emotions and responses. You’ve forgotten to let the Spirit work and instead seek to work our spirits. You operate more like a for-profit corporation than a body of believers, chasing metrics and KPIs behind closed doors rather than seeking the Kingdom of God in community.

Dear Church,

You welcome those committing tolerable sins like alcoholism or love of money while shunning those dealing with homosexuality, drug addiction or homelessness, abandoning them to recover on their own before they can be welcomed. You have a place and programs for those on the path of marrying young and starting a family but have nowhere for unmarried adults. You discuss doctrines like predestination but forget ones like feeding the hungry and loving our enemies. When you’re pondering parables, you imagine yourself in the position of the disciples or the wheat, but you are actually the Pharisee, the sheep-costumed wolf.

Dear Church,

I joined you because of friends. It was a good decision then. Later it became clear we needed to find a group that could accept the children God gave us. I am not sorry we left. It was hard at first, but we have blossomed. Our children are loved for who and what they are. I watched you move backward to a place where women cannot preach or be leaders. It makes me sad. I want to bless you. I hope you can find that place where all are equally welcomed because we are made in God’s image and loved by our Creator.

Dear Church, 

We tried our hardest…and you broke our hearts. We trusted you to listen to the pleas of your members to try to lead in a new and healthy direction, and you shut us out. We were super-involved, dedicated members, but when we left over the issue of [LGBTQ] inclusion, we were met with silence. No one reached out. You broke our hearts and our faith. We joined an [LGBTQ] inclusive church, but our hearts are shattered from our experience. I’m not sure anything will bring us back…how can I trust you with my children’s hearts if I can’t trust you with mine?

Dear Church, 

I left church because issues and theology weren't really discussed. Topics which might be controversial were greatly avoided. "Unity" meant sticking to chit-chat and to established beliefs and practices. There was a lot of goodness in people, but also narrowness and rigidity. More educated members did little or nothing to promote dialogue on important subjects, and pastors seemed to fear it more than anyone. Now, I look for groups that welcome hard questions and good conversations, eager to improve our wisdom.