My husband and I sit on the grassy field across from the main church building. It’s a space designed for worship overflow and churchgoers with dogs — but when it’s sunny, we like to sit outside.
Lounging on a church-provided blanket, eating free church doughnuts and sipping free church coffee, we watch the sermon projected on a big screen, nodding in agreement during poignant breaks in the pastor’s speech. We look like any other believers. But we’re not. We’re imposters.
Indeed, my husband and I aren’t here for the sermon. We’re not here for salvation. We’re here because our two young children love the Sunday school — and we love the child-free break.
We’re not here for salvation. We’re here because our two young children love the Sunday school — and we love the child-free break.
Full disclosure: Both my husband and I grew up going to church and we have a general belief in some sort of God — so, we’re not completely out of place here. But when I stopped going to church at 16, it was a deliberate choice. I was bored with the teen service and I didn’t fit in with the more conservative churchgoing high schoolers, what with my (non-Christian) rock CDs, sips of beer at parties, and my hopes of one day having premarital sex. My mom and I always went to Christmas Eve services after that, but generally, I didn’t miss it.
I likely would have never gone to church regularly again — if I hadn’t heard that this church’s Sunday school was exemplary.
“It’s like private school,” a mom-friend told me. And indeed, with its many clean, bright classrooms customized by age (from baby to grade school), tons of smiling caregivers and countless organized bins full of colorful toys and books, the child care did seem exemplary.
But after a few months of weekly churchgoing, I started to wonder: Is this dishonest? Unethical? Am I going to hell for using our local church for its (top-notch) day care?
Sometimes I picture God looking down at me on the grassy field, his arms crossed, head shaking. “Non-believer, you don’t belong here,” he says in a booming voice. “Drop that doughnut, pick up your kids and be gone!”
But other days, I don’t let my conscience, or images of the big man upstairs, bother me. I’m simply too tired to feel anything — except relief.
As a stay-at-home mom of a preschooler and a toddler (with another baby on the way) who balances a freelance-writing side hustle during nap times, I’m always drained. I don’t sleep much. I wash a lot of dishes, I clean a lot of clothes. When I’m not scouring the house for misplaced dolls or driving a kid to ballet, I’m typing furiously on my computer, trying to make a deadline.
Over the past couple of years, I’ve had babysitters come intermittently so I could run errands solo or so my husband and I could have a quick date. But good babysitters are expensive, and with two kids and slim college funds, it’s hard to justify the luxury.
So, for most of the day, it’s just me. And I’m tired. Overstimulated. Overworked. But coming to church, and dropping off at Sunday school, is a respite. There’s no other time in the week when I can sit for an hour straight, holding my husband’s hand, and enjoy a snack I didn’t scavenge from a forgotten toddler plate.
Who cares if God’s up there shaking his head disapprovingly? If I lay back on my blanket and close my eyes, I won’t see him anyway.
One recent Sunday, we arrived at church a little early, allowing us time to walk around before kid check-in. At the coffee cart, a fellow mom complimented my outfit and we talked for a few minutes about online shopping and parenting. She even recommended a brand of veggie-packed chicken nuggets her kids love. Later, a friendly old couple let my kids play with their puppy. When I went into the bathroom with my double stroller, a smiling woman held the door open and even helped me lift the front wheels up over the doorway bump.
I’d always thought the people at our church were friendly, but that day, everyone was extra kind. It made me feel terrible. Maybe, deep down, I wasn’t only concerned about what God might think of me. I was also worried about these nice people figuring me out.
I kept telling myself I wasn’t actually lying — I wasn’t like the biblical Ananias and Sapphira, who told God they gave all their money to the disciples, but in reality, kept some for themselves. (OK, sometimes I listen to the sermon.) But maybe I was being somewhat deceitful.
Accepting a little bit of child care and a few doughnuts from a large church doesn’t seem so bad, but tricking the honest churchgoers into thinking I was like them, taking advantage of their welcoming attitude — it made me feel dirty.
For a few weeks after, we didn’t go to church. I didn’t even talk to my family about not going. For a few Sundays in a row, I just acted like I forgot. But as the weeks passed, my 4-year-old asked about Sunday school more and more, and eventually, I realized I couldn’t avoid the problem. Eventually, I’d either have to go to church and pretend nothing was wrong, or I’d have to address my guilty feelings. Neither sounded fun.
When we got to church the following Sunday, I felt like people were watching me. Maybe they’d finally noticed I was a faker and a liar. And a doughnut thief. Was it my clothes? Had I overdone it trying to look “churchy” in my maxi dress with a high neckline? Had all the true believers met up the week before to gossip about how I tend to scroll on my phone while everyone else bows their heads?
As I stood in line to drop my daughter off, I glanced around at the other parents, wondering who was going to put me out of my misery and finally call me out. But while I stood, I noticed another mom who looked as tired as I felt. She had a crooked ponytail and green marker doodled all over one arm.
“OK, bye,” she said to her son as he sprinted into the classroom. I could tell she was trying to hide the tension in her voice. As she walked away, she exhaled, her shoulders dropping a little. She was relieved. I recognized the feeling because I’d had it so many times before. Her body language said, “I love my kid more than anything but right now I need to sit somewhere and not be touched.” I knew it well.
I looked at another parent, then another. A lot of them had the same expression as they dropped their kid, or kids, off. They’d been looking forward to this. They were excited for an hour to themselves. Maybe I wasn’t the only one at church for something other than the sermon.
Growing up in a predominately white, middle-class suburb, nearly every kid at my school went to church or synagogue every weekend. Some of them enjoyed the weekly tradition. Other kids complained about it. But like it or not, every weekend we got up, got in the car, and sat for religious teachings for an hour.
I guess that was part of my inspiration for taking my family in the first place: Taking my kids to church seemed like something I was supposed to do. I thought that taking kids to church, giving them some education of God, and some basic moral education, was important. That’s why, I assumed, my mom took me to church. And why her parents took her. But now, looking at the tired moms and dads around me, I was developing a different theory.
Of course, there are a lot of people who are truly devout, who feel more fulfilled with religion in their lives, and want to pass that joy to their kids. And I think that’s admirable. But I was starting to think a good number of us are there for, or at least incentivized by, a free hour of child care — a valuable commodity, especially now, when paying for day care is so hard for many families.
Maybe I don’t feel the same sense of satisfaction others do when listening to a religious sermon, but going to church certainly brings me peace.
If there really is a God, I like to think he wants us to be happy. I like to think he’s looking down at me and not shaking his head, but shrugging the way I do when I let my kids have a popsicle before dinner. “OK, fine,” he says in a gentle tone. “It was a long day, you can have a treat.”
If there really is a God, I like to think he’s looking down at me and shrugging the way I do when I let my kids have a popsicle before dinner. “OK, fine,” he says in a gentle tone. “It was a long day, you can have a treat.”
And as for the nice churchgoers I’m afraid to disappoint, perhaps I’m supposed to accept their kindness and use it as inspiration to be a better person: try to open more doors for strangers, give more compliments and generally be kinder. After all, isn’t that what the Bible is all about? Learning and trying to be a better person?
Recently, my family has been back in our weekly church routine. My husband and I drop off the kids at Sunday school, sit on the lawn and recharge to the sound of the pastor’s voice.