"Special People"

Two situations arose in the last week wherein people I am involved with set up exclusionary gatherings. I have been thinking about this a lot. There are times to be exclusionary. It seems to have something to due with the level of intimacy, as verses the level of publicness of a situation. For example I exclude nearly everyone from my bed, even my cat (she walks on my head, unacceptable).

On the other end of the spectrum I went to Sundown in the City last Thursday - a thoroughly public free concert event, outdoors, downtown. Apparently about seven to ten thousand people included themselves, estimates varied. It was oddly intimate though due to the extremely close proximity of those ten thousand people. When I go there I get on the "people mover," the flowing sections at the sides of the square where people move up and down the square for no apparent reason. Perhaps they are just like me, cruising on the people mover. It's a fun ride, unless you get in front of someone who is playing handzies while on the people mover - not good. I like to practice my "don'tfuckwithme" posture while riding the people mover (I love being extremely tall). It usually works. So with exclusiveness and inclusiveness some areas are clear - very exclusive in the bed, very inclusive in the public square - it is all those middle areas that are shady.

Both of the situations that I got concerned about centered around the church, which is a public setting, but not entirely so. We do have some excluding criteria, though fewer than most churches. I would say our excluding criteria is only that one must behave peacefully within our house. That is all. So Jim Adkisson who shot nine of us last year is definitely in the excluded category. Again the extremes are easy to figure out. It is the more subtle areas that are tricky.

These exclusionary gatherings were not really about church and that was the problem. Two groups were soliciting SOME people from among church for private gatherings. But only SOME people, Special People, were to be included, but that was unclear. In one case it was Special People born female, as verses those who exert huge effort and sacrifice, socially and financially, to become physically female. In the other case, the group was soliciting Special People who by some unclear criteria are manifesting a certain high level of spiritual understanding based on the judgement of the group leader. In both cases the group leader looked around and using her visual and ethereal assessment determined "you people are Special Enough" and "you other people are Not Special Enough." The Not-Special-Enough-People were so informed, with the expected unpleasantness following. In both cases I was deemed special enough. And that makes me very uncomfortable. Sometimes being special is not such a good thing.

I am reminded of the kindergarten lesson about birthday party invitations. It is a lesson for the parents. If you are having a birthday party and ALL of the children in the class are invited, then you may pass out the party invitations in the classroom. However, if only some of the children from the class are invited (say only the boys), then you must mail out the invitations privately. Seems pretty obvious. One is free to hold whatever private gatherings one would care to hold. But going to the public and (supposedly) welcoming setting of the church to gather and organize the meetings is, at best, rude.

"Let brotherly Love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers for thereby some have entertained angels unawares." (Hebrews 13: 1-2) The point is love, the point of everything is love. That is what is special.