FEATURED ESSAY Rev. Melissa Opel 26
REV. MELISSA OPEL The smell of incense is my first memory of stepping into the temple. It was a warm feeling on an already warm day—somehow different but comforting nonetheless. My wife and I had been to an Open House the week before and would later learn it was the Temple’s Obon festival held annually in July. We both had felt too uncertain to stick around for the evening’s events but agreed to come back for service the next week after speaking to a wonderfully nice volunteer and a Minister’s Assistant. Simply exploring and coming to the Temple was frightening. I had left organized religion some 10 years prior after devoting time, energy, and spirit to leading Bible studies, worship services, and even a church plant. 1 During the number of years that I was involved deeply in Christianity, it became less and less of a fit for me. After coming out as lesbian with my now wife, we were asked to step down from leadership, end our relationship, and enter therapy; I was even offered a room at my Pastor’s house. Instead, we left. My wife struggled to hold on to her Christian faith, and I began addressing the questions that had been mounting and going unanswered over the years. As we attempted to find an open and affirming Christian church, I found myself more and more removed from the faith. Finally, a disagreement over dinosaurs with my father-in-law left me done. I stepped into a church once after that disagreement, and it also had painful consequences. It marked the official end of my time in that particular faith. Stepping into the Hondo for the first time, I felt nauseous, scared, and uncertain, but I didn’t have much time to understand the thoughts I was having as we were greeted immediately. 2 Once we found our seats, in the back like any good newcomer, we were greeted by several other people, and then a gay couple came over and said hello as well. I watched the men skeptically- not because they needed to be addressed with skepticism but to see how they were being treated by the rest of the people. The two guys hugged other people, were being greeted with smiles, and seemed at ease in their environment. When service started, I glanced over from time to time only to see that they sat closely and occasionally an arm would drape over a set of shoulders like many other couples. My wife, Becca, and I had never had that privilege to sit close or even to touch in front of other people in a church setting. There was a lot to take in during that first visit. The only thing familiar about the building were the cushioned pews lined neatly in front of us, and it was the one detail I could probably have done without! Trying to take it all in when coming to a new religion is difficult. You don’t mean to compare it to everything you have experienced before but you can’t really help The smell of incense is my first memory of stepping into the temple. It was a warm feeling on an already warm day—somehow different but comforting nonetheless. 1. A church plant is a name given to describe what a large church would do when they grew too big to accommodate the amount of people attending or when they wished to serve an area where an evangelical denomination wasn’t present. The church would send a portion of the ] congregation’s leaders and a few members together, supported, to “plant” a new congregation and bring in unchurched followers. 2. Hondo - The main hall of a Buddhist temple. 27