"Hi, My Name is Liz. Please don't ask me what I do."

This is too funny not to post! I just attended this new non-denom church with the family I am staying with. I filled out a new person form and got a prompt, and very genuine I have to say, email from the pastor of the young adult class. I told him I'd be interested in meeting with him at the church to find out more about their ministry, but then wrote this:

PS- I have to admit I have an extreme aversion to single's groups. I actually have avoided entire churches because they were comprised of what I call "young professional pretty people." For my entire stay at the First Baptist Church of [Hometown] I avoided the Single's group- opting instead to work with the youth and attend their Sunday School. This decision was not primarily to avoid the Single's Sunday School class, but I must admit, it had a lot of bearing on my decision.

I also am averse to a lot of meet-and-greets. This is b/c I don't have a job. So "What do you do?" is a very maddening question. People don't ask, "What is your life about?" or "What has God give you a vision for?" Also, "Where do you live?" has been a hard question. So yeah, really anything inquiring about a career or referring to any sort of stable residence is difficult. As you can glean, meet-and-greets are like a social gauntlet.

Perhaps you can consider that before you tell me about the ministry you lead.

I once wanted to go to a Christian yoga class that was hosted by this non-denom church. I was struggling with road rage that week and a free yoga class sounded like the prescription for some much needed stress relief. I looked forward to setting down my mat, breathing deeply, and stretching. I arrived after a ton of traffic and after a long day of document review. I put down my mat, the class started, and the teacher explained how the class would go- and then invited us to get into small groups to introduce ourselves! Meet and greet. At a frickin' yoga class.

My friend who invited me to the class said I was emanating such a fierce vibe of disapproval she felt it across all the way across my mat and the look on my face was complete disgust. I tried my best to think of some witty fact about myself to deflect the attention from having to divulge I'm not regularly employed. I faked it well enough. But really I just wanted to get to the yoga. But first I had to put a NAME TAG on my yoga mat!

I am hoping this new church will not succumb to the dorky evangelical, non-denom culture of superficial welcoming rituals. Will be sure to recount how my meeting with the pastor goes!