Dear Restoration,

What is church?

In this year of pandemics and lockdowns, restrictions and masks, it’s a question we’ve had to face in ways we could never have imagined. What exactly is church?

We each have our own answers – some of which we’ve had to figure out on the fly – and even now I can imagine the voices of my life group’s seminarians hashing it out between all the possible stances of theology and history (with a dollop of ridiculousness, because that’s how we roll).

“The midnight wind curled round the barn and o’er top of the moonlit snow,

And quiet as a cat, the Tomte came, creeping in so soft and slow.

His gifts he left by the door of the house for the family now sleeping sound,

And when they woke in the morn with cries of delight, not a footstep could be found.”

Dry leaves skittered along the path, driven by a cool autumn wind. Rubbing my arms, I wished I’d grabbed a wrap before fleeing to wander the park. The city’s salons and ballrooms were mad with legends of faeries and wars for All Hallow’s Eve…

When he says grace at the table, he does it in Swedish — and sometimes in song. When we were kids, he put us to bed with stories of wolves chasing our ancestors through the woods at night.

I almost wore my October earrings today — little Lego skeleton heads that dangle on silver wires.

I snapped this photo back when we still called it the coronavirus and being at home every day felt like a weird adventure.

We watched the new Eurovision film on Netflix last night, and — y’all — I STILL have feels about it.