This past Spring it seemed like everything was falling apart. My town, my country, the whole planet were all changing, and not for the better. I felt anxious and frustrated and nothing seemed to help, not even going to FUSF on Sundays. I started to attend FUSF less and less, only going on the Sundays that I had signed up to be the Fellowship Café Crew Chief. And even on those days I referred to myself as the “crabby crew chief.” Special orders did upset me!

When I was asked to pledge for the upcoming year, I didn’t. I told the stewardship team that I was probably going to leave FUSF. I felt disconnected from the FUSF community, and I couldn’t find a way to reconnect. I didn’t know what to do. Bad news poured in every day but I couldn’t see a way to stop the terrible actions taking place.

Glennon Doyle, Anne LaMott, and Rosemary Gladstar, all advised me to be where I am and try to help the people and causes in need around me. Clarrissa Pinkola Estes assured me that, “Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach.”

I was technically still on the FUSF Food Justice Team, so maybe I could strengthen my involvement with that group and try even harder to help heal some of the food insecurity in my town. I was already volunteering to be a monthly part of the Fellowship Café, what if I spent that time focusing on how grateful I am to get to spend some time with many really wonderful people?

In fact, once I really thought about it, I understood that I didn’t really want to leave FUSF. I realized that the problem wasn’t that I needed less FUSF in my life, I actually needed more. I realized that now was the time to engage with my church community and our Principles in a deeper way, and to try harder to actually live those Principles more fully with the Congregation that has been a part of my life for years.