We can be part of multiple communities

Evangelicalism trained us to only be part of one community, but with that mindset we miss out on so much

When I was in college, mired deeply in the miry depths of a particular evangelical Christian fellowship group, I was often faced with choices that pitted this Christian group against another community. For example:

• When sophomore year rolled around, would I live with my friends from my freshman dorm, or would I live with people from the Christian group?

• Would I continue playing clarinet in the school orchestra when the rehearsal times conflicted with Christian fellowship meetings, or would I choose to make myself available to attend every weekly small group and large group?

• When junior year arrived, would I commit to a year of leading a dorm-based Bible study group, or would I consider the possibility of spending a quarter studying abroad?

• Would I spend my summer participating in the Christian group’s service learning internship, or would I look for another job or internship opportunity that might help me explore a different career path?

Every step into deeper investment and leadership in my Christian community felt like a step back from something else.

Evangelical worship…if it doesn’t look like this, it’s not worth spending time on, right? / Photo by John Price on Unsplash

I chose the Christian fellowship almost every time, and I have mixed feelings about this.

I don’t feel that I was forced into it; I genuinely loved the community, the friends I made there, and the sense of purpose it gave me. On the other hand, though, looking back, it’s easy to see the manipulation of it all. Sure, I was not forced—but I was also not not coerced, in the sense of manipulated. 

I was led to believe that there were more holy choices and less holy choices I could make. Some choices were more faithful to God than others. The faithful choices were clear—and they lined up with choosing higher and higher levels of commitment to the fellowship group and everything it had to offer.

To be fair, this was rarely said directly. Sometimes fellowship leaders (at least some of them) would even say what I would say now, which is that the best and most sacred choice is different for every person. But the messaging was inconsistent at best. And the ways people acted and spoke made me feel that the most faithful choice was, or should be, clear. 

This is one of the things I am unlearning, in my post-evangelical journey.

I thought about this sort of thing when I read Alice Wong (

Disability Visibility

)’s reflections, in Year of the Tiger, on the multiple communities she’s a part of. For her, these communities are connected to different aspects of her own identity (e.g. race, ethnicity, gender, disability). Wong reflects:

“Every community, big or small, has conflict, drama, and a whole lot of dysfunction. Every community also has a reservoir of intergenerational wisdom, energy, and love that has the power to build, create, and mobilize for change. As a member of multiple communities, I love them all because they anchor me while providing freedom to splash around with joy unapologetically, to grow, and to carve out new spaces in collaboration with others” (135).

I love this. I love Wong’s realism about what communities are actually like—the awesome parts of them, and the difficult parts too. Communities are rarely completely unhealthy or perfectly, wonderfully healthy. 

And I love the freedom Wong models to be a part of multiple communities. Each one is both an anchor and a place to reach out from. Each one is a place to grow.

Different communities help us grow in different ways, providing different kinds of support and challenge as we do so.

I think that’s beautiful. I think we miss out on so much when we limit ourselves to just one community, as evangelicalism taught many of us to do. 

Those of us who have spent time in evangelical communities were often conditioned to be skeptical of any other communities—of communities held together by anything other than a particular set of religious beliefs, which of course must be our particular set of religious beliefs. 

We were taught to be wary. To limit our involvement, so as not to be corrupted or led astray. 

We were taught to enter other-than-evangelical communities with a mindset of evangelism, a need to convert others. That was considered the primary reason we were there. To “minister,” perhaps. Or, to “serve on a mission field.”

When we see communities as fields ripe for harvest, we enter in like a piece of farm machinery / Photo by Dietmar Reichle on Unsplash

This kind of mindset limits the extent to which we’re actually able to exist as a healthy part of a community. It clips the wings of the genuineness and mutuality of any relationships we’re able to form there.

I’m unlearning these things, I hope. 

As I do so, I’m appreciating the wisdom of those like Wong who have spent time investing in multiple communities and experiencing the joy of it. 

To be honest, there are times when I miss being so completely “all in” in a faith community. Participating in everything, leading many things, being so central to everything happening there. There was something rewarding about that, something comforting and affirming. 

But I don’t think my relationship to church will ever be like this again. And I think that’s okay. I’m learning to embrace it.

I still go to (a progressive) church, because it’s a community I want to be a part of. But not at the exclusion of all else. I want to learn to be a healthy part of my church community and a healthy part of other communities, in a way that’s balanced and genuine and good for everyone involved.

I see the gifts of this. I see how we miss out when we only see people who share our religious beliefs as our kin.

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How about you? How has your view of community (or multiple communities) evolved over time? How has your relationship to church changed? What are you learning, and what are you unlearning?

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A note: A friend let me know recently that Alice Wong, whose work I’ve been quoting from and reflecting on here as well as in a couple other recent posts, has faced some major health crises in the last couple years and has a GoFundMe to help with the costs of care. (I join her in hating that this is where we’re at as a society.) Here’s a link where she shares more about what’s been going on for her, and here’s a link to contribute financially if you have the means and would like to.