Thoughts, reflection and meditation on a church closing
Mar 1st, 2010 by Syd
By Kirby O’Bannon
Today, February 28, 2010, is the last day of existence for Berry Boulevard Presbyterian Church as we know it. The church of my youth, in continuous operation since 1908, conducted its last regular worship service at its current location this morning. In the hope of helping us understand how we got to this point, and to reassure ourselves that we are already being wonderfully and truly blessed as we move on, I’d like to offer these thoughts as we sort out the complex feelings connected with closing a church.
For me it has been a 56-year journey, encompassing all but the first 3 years of my life. I was baptized in this church at age 3, and except for a brief hiatus when I was living in another state, I have continuously participated in its life, also as a full communing member since my public profession of faith in my teen years. For the first time in my adult life, I’m faced with deciding what to do now about church. Others in our faith family are faced with the same challenge, including some for whom ours was the only church they had ever participated in on a regular basis.
Much has happened historically and spiritually not only in Berry Boulevard Presbyterian Church, but also in its neighborhood, the Presbyterian Church, the Church of Jesus Christ worldwide, and the world itself, since my youth. Evangelicals are thriving, mainlines are declining, small congregations are disappearing, and mega-churches are (or at least were until the current recession) enjoying explosive growth and unparalleled prosperity. Our responses thus far to many of those developments have helped shape the Presbyterian Church, explaining to some extent how we’ve arrived at this point.
Downtown Louisville was legally racially segregated the first few years of my life, until a Presbyterian Police Court Judge named Henry Triplett excused people of color whose only “crime” was sitting down to have a meal at a whites-only lunch counter. The leadership of many congregations, including unfortunately ours, was out of touch with the social and spiritual dynamic that demanded such change, but those of us who persevered helped to bring about the end of legally-sanctioned racial segregation. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 became law, our Pastor’s position moderated, and those on both sides of controversial issues continued to the best of our ability to glorify God under the Rev. Samuel R. Vanover’s leadership, until his sudden death in 1968. We couldn’t see it then, but the forces that brought these issues to a head worked to drastically change the face of our congregation, and the era of decline began.
Vatican II happened when I was 11 years old, and later became the foundation upon which I was able to become a full communing member of the Roman Catholic Church, while maintaining my membership in the Presbyterian Church. Theologically conservative Presbyterians and Catholics alike discouraged ecumenism between the two faiths, but the societal and spiritual forces of change again overpowered most such opposition, culminating for me in my marriage to my beautiful high school sweetheart in a nuptial Mass. My current life’s partner was likewise raised Catholic. Yet at least one member that I know of left our fellowship not so very long ago, citing her son’s marriage to a Catholic as one of the important factors in her decision.
In the same years as the tension between Protestant and Catholic Americans eased, the two largest branches of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (”UPCUSA,” or northern), and the Presbyterian Church in the United States (”PCUS,” or southern, of which Berry Boulevard was a part), merged to become the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), reuniting more than 100 years after the War Between the States had split us over the issue of slavery. The Presbytery of Louisville had already become a Union Presbytery, to reduce duplication of effort and expense, while allowing both groups to maintain their primary theological perspectives, recognizing that the two largest branches of the Presbyterian Church in this nation had far more in common than not. Enlightened attitudes toward equal opportunity, and efforts to resist trends opposing it, permeated both; the line was not nearly so starkly demarcated between the UPCUSA and PCUS in the 1970’s as it had been in the 1860’s.
Nevertheless, this merger of the northern and southern branches, for which I was privileged to vote in favor as a delegate to Presbytery, appears to have been a mistake, as Presbyterians have become more, not less, divided, largely due to the same issues that kept us apart before, except that there paradoxically does not seem to be so much room for theological diversity within the reunited PCUSA. At this writing, the number of members of the PCUSA is less than the number who belonged to the UPCUSA prior to the reunification. As Kierkegaard observed, we live forward and learn in reverse.
As the years rolled on, and narrow-mindedness slowly gave way to greater inclusivity, we found ourselves in the same predicament as many other mainline congregations: Those on whose generous support the church had relied left for more like-minded fellowships, and those of us who remained,
while being granted at last an opportunity to live our vision, confronted unprecedented challenges. It was an exciting and invigorating time in the life of the church. New ways of living our faith evolved, and people who had never before considered being part of church life were deeply and meaningfully touched. But we couldn’t figure out how to maintain the financial stability and participation required to keep our church operating. As long-term neighbors and their children left, and were replaced by a less stable demographic, membership declined, while expenses maintained their relentless path upward. We discerned that the time had come to relieve that ever-increasing tension.
Mainline churches in general are bedeviled by this problem. The Adversary is, I’m quite certain, dancing with glee every time we lose members over this, because the issues usually blamed for divisiveness are false! Why do we find it contrary to God’s law of love to reach out to the disenfranchised, or to extend the hand of fellowship to those in unconventional lifestyles? Are we afraid of being polluted by what some say is someone else’s sin, or can we not see the log in our own eye? Have we become become so self-assured theologically that, similar to the situation in Congress, we find no room for accommodation and compromise within Presbyterian precepts?
We are battle-weary, and that tends to make us reluctant to stand up for what is right. As the old saying goes, you have to stand for something or you’ll fall for anything. In other words, it seems to me that the Church needs to reaffirm its foundational principles, and act with the faith that the Holy Spirit will convict its leadership and members to make decisions that will glorify God, while staying focused on Jesus’ mandate to make disciples of all nations. And we MUST insure that absolutely nobody feels slighted or unwelcome just because we disagree with them or display superficial differences, because we serve a God of love, Who gave us a Savior to save us from our sinful nature. In the only Church I want to be a part of, there is room for all ethnic, philosophical, socio-economic, and theological trends.
The closing of the doors of Berry Boulevard Presbyterian Church is therefore both an ending and a beginning. It gives us an opportunity to step back and re-examine our life as a community of faith, and our relationships with those outside our immediate faith family. Those who have left for the Presbyterian Church of America, where many of the former PCUS members ended up, and to a lesser extent the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, are clearly uncomfortable with the direction in which they perceive the Presbyterian Church is moving. Gen-X’ers and their children are not supporting any mainline churches, leaving the rest of us to ponder what to do, or not do, now.
These are all challenges the Church must continue to confront as it carries out the Great Commission. It is therefore encouraging to see Disciple-making taking form in ways we could never have imagined until recently, as faith families show more willingness to combine sound fundamental precepts (to be distinguished from fundamentalism) with innovative ways to reach out to everyone, and grow real churches that exist without regard to buildings. Missions more concerned with addressing genuine human need than with how many new members have been added to the rolls are enjoying a resurgence in spite of the current difficult economic climate. The recently announced Ecclesia Project is only one of many ways that God’s children are experiencing God’s “doing a new thing,” as the prophet Isaiah expressed it.
In closing, we can take a great deal of satisfaction and gratitude from the plethora of blessings bestowed by God upon the Church universal, as well as upon the flock at Berry Boulevard and the many, many lives it has touched. It requires faith to acknowledge and accept that God’s ways are not our ways, that although the church doors have closed, God will open many, many others. In some form or fashion, Berry Boulevard Presbyterian Church will live on, for even though the name may some day be a distant memory, the good that continues from this church will remain so long as there is a Church.
May the peace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship and communion of the Holy Spirit, be upon all who call upon the name of the Lord, glorify God and are predestined to enjoy God’s blessings forever.
Kirby O’Bannon
Former Ruling Elder and Treasurer, Berry Boulevard Presbyterian Church
Louisville, Kentucky
