The Socialization of J-Funk

I actually went to church on Sunday!! I was going to go on another hike with my Studly Hubby, but he backed out due to a pressing assignment (mixed with a bad case of allergies), so I thought, hey, I should go interact with some people, and I set off down the road to a church that looked nice. It turned out, this church only has about 15 members but they claimed they are a well-known church nonetheless ("small but with loud voices"). I think they are pretty well-known; I was interested in them because of some info on the internet that I found telling of their association with peace groups (they loan out their church facilities for a well-attended political movie night and discussion on Friday nights, the movies are mostly anti-war movies), their affiliation with helping the homeless (the pastor used to be the chaplain of a homeless shelter and the church is also very involved in that), and their openness to all types of people.

I am not exactly well-known for being the church-going type, but let me tell you, when you move to a new place far far away from your family and friends and start a new job where you don't know anyone, it starts sounding like a pretty good deal to become part of a welcoming church community. It was even more tempting that this particular church is just down the street (no driving involved!), and it turns out they were very welcoming indeed. In Minneapolis, I tried to go to a church but it was in a desperately difficult to drive to part of town and the people weren't very friendly, so I nixed the whole church idea pretty fast. Here in Seattle, I found a church I can walk to, everybody was nice, and they even have some pretty cool stuff going on the rest of the week. So, I may go back. But don't go telling everyone I'm a church-goer yet - I'm not sure I'm ready for that big of a step.