Unchurched | David’s Subdural Hematoma Blues Blog
By David Concepcion
November 14, 2021
Of the many bad habits I’m trying to change for the better, one has surprisingly been left behind: going to church. I’m a Unitarian Universalist by birth and practice, but I haven’t been to a church service since some time during the lockdown. I was with the UU congregation in Medford, MA since 2003. Sophia grew up in that church and I even introduced her to the church during one of my first Sunday visitations with her. But somewhere during the years from 2018 to 2020, things changed for me. I thought the community changed, and it did a little, but more importantly I changed. I was no longer as close to them as I once was and I felt more and more distant. After trying to attend a virtual service and finding the whole thing nowher near a spiritual thing for me, I resigned my membership at the church. I am still friends with some people at the church (and Sophia was asked to bridge with her friends last year as they all planned to do together when they were much younger kids), but I cut ties with them.
What I wasn’t expecting was to stop going to church altogether. Right now we’re still doing virtual services around the US, and some places are “hybrid” services (some in attendance, others over Zoom). But I don’t find virtual services fulfilling in the same way as going to a service. Having said that, the last time I woke up in time to go to a service, virtual or otherwise, has been several months ago. My work schedule hasn’t changed much and there is literally a UU church up the street from me with a minister I knew from young adult conferences, but I still haven’t made any effort to go to church. Lately I really need to sleep during the weekends to get through the next week, and often that means sleeping through church time. I don’t feel lost without it, but it’s a little annoying that there’s nothing out there to grab me back to the church.
I don’t know if I need to find my way back even though I do miss some UU community. Right now I’m just floating by. Maybe once all the pandemic has gone away and we can do things in person again, I may try to go to a church again. Right now, I’m one of the many no longer at home in church.
