Membership

(Taking a look at small group and church structure through the lens of the Twelve Traditions of A.A.)

"Our membership ought to include all who suffer from alcoholism. Hence we may refuse none who wish to recover. Nor ought A.A. membership ever depend upon money or conformity. Any two or three alcoholics gathered together for sobriety may call themselves an A.A. group, provided that, as a group, they have no other affiliation."

     We've all heard - and possibly used - the terms "lost, non-believers, unsaved, and non-Christian." I know I've used them in the past. These labels have become our way of pinning down the people who aren't members of the club. We love to have qualitative measures by which to define people's relationship with God, relationship with us, and relationship with the world. Therefore, we can go down our list of what it means to be (fill in the blank), and if the person under examination doesn't line up with our core beliefs, we can confidently say that person is in or out. 

    The problem with this is, we can't know what only God knows. We can't read people's motives like a novel. So, when it comes to membership of a small group or church, we make requirements based on qualitative prerequisites. "When did you accept Christ? Do you believe A, B, C, and D? Have you been baptized?" It's our way of making ourselves feel better about who we're surrounding ourselves with. After all, none of us would want an undercover atheist among our ranks, right? 

     One of the things I love about my church is, there are no membership rules. Each person declares him/herself a member. There are no questionnaires or surveys to fill out. There's no giving requirement. The membership decision is left squarely on the shoulders of the individual. 

     But, this tradition goes a step further. Not only are there no membership requirements except the desire to stop drinking (which, in the religious structure would be like a desire to stop playing God, or a desire to stop being selfish), but since the leaders are not governors, no one can tell another member to do anything. No one can compel another to do anything, and no one can require another to give anything. No one can tell another to leave, no matter how disruptive, threatening, or abusive. 

     Sometimes, it's easy to get into the frame of thinking that says, "The problems are outside. They're not in here." And so, the mission of the church becomes to reach the lost. Over time, this can become a very conceited outlook. We can ignore or forget that we in the church are just as lost as anyone else, making our membership be the defining mark of who's in and who's out. 

    Last Sunday, our pastor introduced to us a couple that he and his small group had been helping out with for the past year. There were four adopted kids who required a lot of work. As the pastor introduced them, it became clear that they were gay. I could feel the tension in the room, or probably just inside myself. I'd never experienced this sort of thing inside a church building. 

    It was baby dedication day, and the gay couple wanted to dedicate their babies, and invite the community to help them raise their kids. One of the men even made a video for the kids as a way of showing his appreciation and love for them. The only desire the couple had was to show the love of God to their kids, and it was enough. There wasn't any need for a survey. It was beautiful. There wasn't a single objection in the community to take part in helping out the kids whenever possible, and the couple left with their kids that day experiencing the opposite of what they'd experienced in the past when it came to church. On one of the slideshows of the video, the couples' garage was spray painted with the words, "Kill The Gays!" Because they had been required to jump through certain hoops, and follow certain rules, they just didn't feel a sense of belonging anywhere they went. 

    The principle behind this tradition is learning how to let people decide for themselves if they're members or not. When we do this, we learn how to stop judging people based on appearance and action. We leave the judgment up to God, and learn how to function together as people who want to grow spiritually and communally. This principle overflows into every aspect of life where people are concerned. We learn to stop trying to figure people out, and start loving people where and how they are. 

Group Question: Does our group exclude anyone from attending the group?

Personal Questions: 

1. In my mind, do I prejudge some new members as losers?
2. Is there some kind of person whom I privately don't want in my group?
3. Do I set myself up as a judge of whether a newcomer is sincere or phony?
4. Do I let language, religion (or lack of it), race, education, age, or other such things interfere with my carrying the message?
5. Am I overimpressed by a celebrity, a doctor, a clergyman, an ex-convict? Or can I just treat new members simply and naturally as one more sick human, like the rest of us?
6. When someone turns up at group needing information or help (even if he/she can't ask for it aloud), does it really matter to me what they do for a living? Where they live? What their domestic arrangements are? Whether they have been to the group before? What their other problems are?