In March 2021, I made public my departure from the Southern Baptist Convention, the denomination I’d loved all my life and served since I was 12.
When we entered the foyer, the double doors to the sanctuary were 20 feet ahead of us and wide open. We were looking to slip subtly into a pew, but a whole handful of people were huddled at the door. A man around our age with a gentle face and warm, genuine smile was among them. He had on a white robe overlaid with a green stole bearing a grapevine pattern. He reached out his hand to me and, in a louder whisper, introduced himself as the rector. “Welcome to our church. And you are?”
“Beth—” I hesitated for half a second—“Moore.”
“Oh!” he said, tilting his head back with surprise and an infectious, harmless chuckle. “Like Beth Moore.”
“Unfortunately, yes.” The verger who’d worked with him for decades would inform me later with a wide grin that the rector was simply amused I had the same name as the infamous Beth Moore. Nothing further occurred to him.
“Come right on in,” he said in the dearest way. “We’re glad to have you.”
Somewhere around 120 people were seated in the pews of the sanctuary. We’d hardly sat down when a bell rang….
I love imagining @BethMooreLPM introducing herself to a rector who's familiar enough to say "like Beth Moore!" but not enough to know it's her https://t.co/CxAuG7UhOJ
— kate shellnutt (@kateshellnutt) March 6, 2023