Yours Truly,
Creative Works… 222
by Emily Christine Davis
My Dearest Churches, You are probably wondering why I’m writing. It’s been a while since we saw each other, and I know I’m not keen on seeing you again. Because of you I struggle a lot, with people, with trusting, and with obeying. Nothing else could have hurt me in the same way. There is no other person, group, or organization which holds the position that you do in Christianity and in my world, but there is also no one else in the world who could have given me what you gave me. The first of you I remember meeting is the megachurch. You were so big that we took shuttles across the parking lot to attend church; your nicknames were ‘The Jesus Dome’ and ‘Six Flags Over Jesus’. I met you there because we needed a new church, and my grandparents knew you. But you didn’t want me then. You shamed my parents for being from Las Vegas; and you shamed my family for not being Baptist; and you shunned us, locking us out of your world – effectively kicking us out of your home. With your average weekly audience at six thousand people, why couldn’t you overlook me and my family? Why did you have to start our endless journey? I think of you often in this place, and I wonder who I could’ve been if we had worked out then. I might not have been as resilient, but I could’ve been happier. I met you again when we went to a small church. It was nice to see you again, and I really wanted us to get along this time, as you probably remember. I saw you every Sunday morning with my parents and my brother. You were smaller in your numbers and your campus, but
