When the Church Has Hurt
A Reflection on Neighbors Who Are Absent, and an Invitation to Easter
One of the most common pastoral questions I am asked—often by well-intentioned parents, grandparents, siblings, friends, and neighbors—is some version of this: “How can I convince my loved one to come to church with me?”
Usually the story goes something like this: I’ve invited them. I’ve asked them. I’ve mentioned it a few times. But it feels like there’s a gap there.
Behind that question is something beautiful. It comes from love. It comes from the desire to share something meaningful with someone you care about. And in many ways, that desire reflects Jesus’ own command to the Church. In what Christians often call the Great Commission, Jesus tells his followers:
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.” Matthew 28:19–20
Wanting someone you love to experience the life of faith is a good and noble impulse. It is, quite literally, part of our calling as Christians.
But there is also a reality we must acknowledge honestly. Many people who hesitate to come to church are not indifferent. They are not lazy. They are not spiritually uninterested.
They are hurt.
In our culture today there is a phrase that gets used often—sometimes casually, but often very seriously: “church hurt.” And while the phrase may be modern, the experience behind it is very real.
For some people, church hurt comes from being dehumanized. Someone may have been told they were less worthy because of their gender, their race, their age, or their background. Others have been told that their identity or their family made them unwelcome in the house of God.
For others, church hurt comes from abuse—sometimes emotional, sometimes spiritual, and tragically sometimes physical. Scripture has occasionally been misused not as a source of healing but as a weapon. Words meant to proclaim grace have been twisted into tools of control.
Sometimes the hurt comes from something quieter but just as damaging. A young person asks honest questions about faith and is told their curiosity is heretical. Someone struggling with grief is handed a platitude like “God just needed another angel.” Someone battling anxiety or depression is told to stop their medication and “just trust God,” with consequences that can be devastating.
And sometimes the hurt is simply the accumulated experience of Christians behaving in ways that look nothing like Christ.
It is important for us to understand that this pain is not incidental. For many people, it is deep. It is formative. It shapes how they think about faith and whether they feel safe anywhere near a church building again.
Even if we personally did not cause that harm—even if we reject the theology or attitudes that produced it—the reality remains that the Church is one body. When one part wounds another, the whole body must grieve.
Jesus tells a parable about a shepherd who leaves ninety-nine sheep to search for the one that has wandered away. That story is not just about celebration when someone returns. It is also about acknowledging loss. When sheep disappear from the flock, the shepherd does not shrug and move on. The shepherd goes looking.
In some cases today, the sheep did not simply wander away. They were pushed.
This is one of the reasons I love the Episcopal Church. We are not a church built around rigid doctrinal tests or ideological purity. Beyond affirming the ancient faith expressed in the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed, we make generous room for people to wrestle, to question, and to grow.
Even if you are still struggling with those creeds—even if you are still figuring out what you believe—you are welcome here.
You are welcome in the waters of baptism.
You are welcome at the altar of Christ.
You are welcome to seek healing, prayer, blessing, and companionship in the life of the Church.
We believe that curiosity is not the enemy of faith. In many ways, it is the beginning of faith.
Our hope is that the diversity of God’s creation—young and old, male and female, gay and straight, questioning and committed, faithful disciple or cautious skeptic—can encounter the same hospitality, grace, forgiveness, and welcome in the body of Christ.
Because yes, the Church has sometimes gotten things wrong.
The Church is both divine and human. It carries the good news of Christ, but it is also made up of people who are imperfect, flawed, and still learning what it means to love as Jesus loves.
We have sometimes entangled the gospel with politics in ways that cloud its clarity.
We have sometimes chased cultural relevance in ways that diluted our witness.
We have sometimes spoken loudly about judgment while whispering about grace.
And so, if someone you love hesitates to walk through the doors of a church, there may be a reason. But here is the good news: evangelism does not begin with arguments or persuasion. It begins with relationship.
As we approach Easter, I would like to invite you to consider something simple and intentional. Think of one person in your life—a friend, a neighbor, a relative, maybe even a former parishioner—someone who you know has been disappointed or wounded by the Church.
Instead of trying to convince them that they are wrong, simply invite them.
Invite them to sit with you on Easter morning. Invite them to share in the Easter breakfast. Invite them to hear the story again—the story that death does not win, that resurrection is real, that what has been broken can be made new.
You do not have to solve all their questions.
You do not have to atone for all the ways Christians have hurt them.
You do not have to have every answer.
Simply make the invitation.
Sit beside them. Walk with them. Let them encounter the grace of Christ through the ordinary kindness of a friend.
That is where true evangelism begins.
And then, trust God to do what God does best: heal what has been broken, restore what has been wounded, and raise to new life all that once seemed lost
Pax et Bonum!
Fr. Ben +
