As a teenager moving school I found it difficult to adjust and find somewhere I belonged when I moved away. To my astonishment I ended up moving back to my childhood home, moving school again, without any opportunity to say goodbye to friends at the other school. It felt like everything I’d wanted had come true, but still there was a sting of unfinished business as it happened so fast.
We visited my dad, as was the routine every fortnight. However this Sunday night was different, rather than mum collecting us after our traditional Sunday roast, it was our Grandpa who turned up. No explanation, just that mum would speak to us back at their house, in Cumbernauld. My mum done everything for us but coming from a difficult upbringing I did feel anxious about changes, it came with dread as to what had happened now. Turned out that things were changing that night, faster than anybody would have expected. I went to dads on Friday from one school, but on Tuesday I was going back to my old school. I thought dreams came true…
Moving back to Cumbernauld had been everything I’d wanted since moving away, I wanted to be back with my family, back with friends and back at church. At this point I was still going to Cumbernauld every other weekend, getting lifts from dad to go to Saturday nights in Glasgow. Doing everything to make the mark. However it was never enough. So being back in Cumbernauld, at 16 now I was absolutely buzzing. What is didn’t anticipate was that church would now clash with School. I was always the person who got on with everyone at school, got stuck in both academically and with sports. I’d never had to think about things at school carrying back to church, it wasn’t something I ever expected to cause issue but somehow it did.
Being back in Cumbernauld, I fitted back in with friends so easily, it was just like sliding on your old pair of comfies. Very quickly I realised everything wasn’t quite as simple as I thought, there was younger church folks at my school who seemed to want to tag along with me. Three years my junior, it wasn’t cool. Despite attempts to discourage, they wouldn’t leave me along at school, church was quickly seeping into my friendships at school and putting my balance at risk. To salvage my friendships my status at school I had to cut this off. It wasn’t normal. Not to me anyways. I tried explaining via texts, trying to make it clear that school was a system and it wasn’t cool to have folks in 2nd year trying to hang out with the 5th years. Nothing was working, I was at my wits ends. My friends found it so frustrating and could see the impact it was having on me. As a group we basically told the individual to ‘f*ck off’… they took it and there it was I was free at school again. But things at church was about to get a whole lot more complicated. Through this experience I had started to drift away from meetings, was only going twice a week now, Friday nights and Sunday nights.
Once I’d come back to Cumbernauld I had thrown myself fully at church, I’d moved down to sit in the front row, was at all the meetings, helping with everything, even holding down a Sunday school role. When things started to get tough at school I slowly dropped off, trying to distance myself from the individual causing so much stress. But that meant distancing myself from church, queue the texts; there wasn’t a week that went by I wasn’t asked where I’d been. Even though as a 16 year old I was still there twice a week, that wasn’t enough. There was a youth weekend coming up, all the youth got together at Cedars school for the weekend, and special meetings targeting youth. I’d signed up to go, and at the time really hoped that weekend would be special for me, giving me some clarity on what becoming a difficult balance between school and church.
The week of the youth weekend had come, and I was contacted by the youth leader informing me that the minister of Cumbernauld SMC thought it unwise that I go to the youth weekend, but I was welcome to go to the Saturday night youth meeting. I was absolutely gobsmacked, where had this come from, what could have happened… this was supposed to be a weekend for me to find something to help me through my struggles. Looking back the choices are clear enough but at a confused 16 year old girl it felt like a disastrous situation. I ended up arguing with the youth leader, she sent my money back to me via the young person i was having issue with at school just to make things worse. It felt like the world was spiralling. I withdrew further from church, feeling hurt and u supported. I found out soon after the weekend that the young person had gone to the Cumbernauld minister and informed them I had swore at them at school and had been unkind. Qualities that did not sit well with her. I was so hurt. Id done everything to try and resolve the situation but this young person was making my life hell and nobody seemed to see it.
For a few months my attendance at church was zero. After that I felt lost, I missed that structure SMC offered. I ended up going back a few times, moving myself further back in meetings and avoiding the minister as id still not actually been spoken to. The hurt went deeper than I knew. One Sunday after the morning service, the youth leader was taking me home and to my horror the minister was also coming in the car. While the youth leader dealt with lock up, the minister came and sat by me on the benches. She asked where Id been and why I wasn’t down the front anymore. I just shrugged, not knowing what to say. It was at that moment I realised how twisted a view the leaders had. I was then told that if I wanted to be part of this church my behaviour toward young people needed to change or I wasn’t welcome.
Pardon, what was I hearing… even now looking back I struggle to understand why that was the approach of the minister of Cumbernauld SMC. A 16 year old, going through difficult family circumstances, struggling to adapt back into school; now rather than support I was being asked to leave or change. I don’t see what I as an individual done, that was so bad. Not once was I asked for my perspective of the situation. I had privileges taken from me, opportunities and never being given a chance to explain my side of events. It still baffles me.
From that moment on, I refused to step foot in SMC for 5 years. My head told me I was basically banned from the church, that is how it felt. It is especially difficult now as an adult, to look back and understand why that situation was handled in such a poor way. I had been a member of the church for 6/7 years, given so much of my time for a teenager to their causes and meetings, only to be thrown to the kerb for one mistaken word. It is no wonder we feel so harshly judged as adults when even teenagers are being held to the higher account. All in the name of Holiness, that SMC seem to claim they deserve more than any other church in the world. What I would give to go and tell that 16 year old me, that I had done nothing wrong, that the problem was not on me. Maybe then I wouldn’t always worry about what stories others can carry about me. Maybe some of my anxieties that I battle every single day wouldn’t be such mountains to overcome. All these maybes… realising now that they could have been resolved had situations been handled with love rather than judgment.
I hope that, 14 years on from this experience things have changed, that no other young adults are subject to judgement on only one side of a story. Any experienced adult knows that there is always two sides, to hand out punishment without first understanding the whole situation can cause so much harm. Nobody should be subject to this. As we are told many times; Love is the greatest commandment of all’. Listen and do not judge, maybe then the scars can begin to heal.