It isn’t unusual for Texas churches to have wide open campuses and ours in Dallas is no different. We have four permanent buildings, only two of which are directly connected. 

Two additional temporary buildings are used for education and storage. Parking lots separate the “temporaries” from the permanent buildings. 

Our closest neighbors are a Jewish synagogue and a Little League ballpark. We share a block with an elementary school and wide open spaces surround us. 

But in the quarter century I’ve been a member of this congregation, safety concerns have changed our perception of all this space. Gradually, even reluctantly, we have added security protocols.

These include background checks on all employees and staff, locked doors and security lights across the campus. Children and teens moving between buildings are accompanied at all times by an adult. Uniformed police officers are on site. 

I remember the shock I felt the first time I saw armed National Guards standing at the entrances and along the concourse of Dallas Love Field airport after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Our friendly hometown airport, the setting for so many happy reunions and joyous surprise encounters, suddenly hinted at threat. It was a sign of things to come.

We have become accustomed to armed guards at shopping malls and stadiums. We expect security at major and small events. 

We are demanding armed police officers at every public school in our Texas communities. We get to know “our” police officers by name.

This week at our church, we reached a new level of anxiety and defense. A police officer stood inside the door to our sanctuary when choir members arrived for midweek choir practice. I don’t think it was what the psalmist had in mind when singing, “I’d rather be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord.” 

Nevertheless, I pause to wonder. I don’t wonder whether we should take all these precautions. We have an obligation as good citizens and good neighbors to protect all who enter our doors, particularly children and guests. 

But I do wonder whether we are standing for anything that actually warrants our being targeted by those who would harm us. What do we stand for?

Do we embody good news to people experiencing poverty? Do we advocate for the release of the unjustly incarcerated, the trafficked and the prisoners of our constant wars? Do we work to enlighten the blind and to free the oppressed?

Do we use whatever powers we have to protect our public schools, so that all children, regardless of race or religion, social position or financial privilege, are given the opportunity to learn, thrive and participate in our collective opportunities and freedom from threat?

Do we press to make good health care available to everyone, whether rural, urban or suburban or even our resident and newly arrived immigrants— regardless of their religion or none, nationality or immigration status? 

Are we willing to risk our own social position to relieve the oppressions experienced by so many of our neighbors? Is our church a sanctuary? Or are we just an activity center in Sunday casual?

I wonder.

Jesus was willing to call out his own neighbors for their assumption of privilege. He reminded the good folk of Nazareth that God sent Elijah to help a Lebanese widow during a famine and Elisha to cure a Syrian general with leprosy. It almost got Jesus killed just as his ministry was beginning. 

This brings us back to the subject of doorkeepers. Tragic experience has taught us that it is necessary to have professional doorkeepers whose responsibility is to keep our members, visitors and staff safe. 

But what about the other doorkeepers? Do our pulpiteers, chosen leaders and snarky self-appointed gatekeepers welcome the strangers, the oppressed, the abused, the different? Or do they protect us from the “deplorables,” however we may define them?  

If we are a Christian, somewhere in our faith background, there is a “deplorable.”

Someone was the first in our faith lineage who chose to follow Jesus. Someone chose to walk among the untouchables. 

Someone dared to read the Bible for themself. Someone was ridiculed, abused, tortured or killed so we can read and interpret the Bible for ourselves, worship as we choose, love whom we will and share what we believe freely. 

The psalmist proclaimed, “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than live in the tents of wickedness” (Psalm 84:10).

We are all doorkeepers of a sort. The question is whether we choose to keep people out or welcome them in. Do we dare become so welcoming that our neighbors notice?

I know it seems trite, but WDJD? What did Jesus do? Remember, in the end, it got him killed.