(RNS) — These days, Felicia Murrell is just as likely to be found meditating at her ancestral altar as she is to be quoting the Gospel of John.
A life coach and former pastor, Murrell has decades of experience in religious leadership. But after spending most of her life in churches that spanned the theological spectrum — and experiencing seasons of what she calls “church hurt” — she currently considers herself “interspiritual,” and her version of church often comes in the form of a spiritually hybrid group of women who gather over glasses of wine.
In her new book, “And: The Restorative Power of Love in an Either/Or World,” Murrell’s penchant for resisting binaries and pre-written formulas is front and center. It’s even evident in the book’s unorthodox structure — rather than chapters, Murrell uses large ampersands to separate entries.
Brimming with reflections on such topics as race, church and wonder and interspersed with whimsical ink drawings from artist Jonathon Stalls, Murrell’s book is an invitation to explore an untethered spirituality, where God is Love, and Love doesn’t belong to any one institution. Religion News Service spoke to Murrell about Jesus as a model for spiritual fluidity, what spiritual community can look like outside the church and what not to do when engaging with someone who is deconstructing. This story has been edited for length and clarity.
Can you tell me the story behind this book?
I began writing this book leading up to the 2016 election and then moving into 2020 with the pandemic, racial unrest and another election cycle. I was noticing the chasm, how society was moving to a more extreme polarity, with no place for both/and. And in my own journey of deconstruction, I was trying to move from the black and white of extremism, of good vs. bad, sacred vs. secular, trying to embrace a spectrum of reality. It came out in my writing, and before I knew it, I had a collection of some poetry, some prose and sermons.
The power of capital “L” love is central to your book. How would you describe or define what that type of love is?
In First John, the author writes, ‘Beloved, let us love one another, for God is love.’ I believe we’re all created in the likeness of a higher power. And for me that divine being is ‘Love.’ So at the core of every one of us, really all of creation, all sentient beings, is Love.
In the American church, we often approach God through reason. God sits outside of ourselves. I did a lot of studying of the Bible, being in church spaces. I was still a very angry person. What changed me was when I became quiet enough to commune with Love. As we sit in stillness, all the wounds we repress often rise to the surface. It was the first time I came face to face with myself, and in that, I came face to face with divine Love. Love sees me fully. And I want to live in a world where I am fully seen, where I’m fully known, where I can exist in my skin, and can offer that same kind of freedom to every single person.
You write that “all too often, ‘Christianity’ in white spaces is synonymous with politeness.” Can you say more?
There’s an idea in white church spaces where we collapse the complexity of our humanity into sameness. They say, very politely, don’t focus on the differences. We’re all the same. But this cry for unity looks like assimilation. A lot of Black people that attend multiethnic churches feel like they have to bite their tongues. But we get to oneness and unity through our differences, through our diversity.
So much of Christianity is event-based, contextual relationships. You go to church together, and then you go home. There’s a lot of politeness rather than curiosity and the kind of relational connection that allows me to see others fully.
What might Jesus teach us about spiritual fluidity?
I think the way of Jesus, the way of Love, is not as rigid or binary as most fundamentalists would like us to believe. When you start looking at the Bible through the lens of inclusion and affirmation, you begin to see this. The wisdom of Jesus was not to come in and necessarily create another religion, but it was to offer a way of Love that was deeper than just follow these rules, repeat this prayer. There’s a dynamism to it. And we’ve made it a how-to manual, when really, I think the model that was being offered was, how do I live in relationship with people?
You’ve described yourself as embracing interspirituality. What does that mean to you?
I say that Christianity is my mother tongue. But I also glean prayers and practices and meditations and inspiration from Taoism, Buddhism, ancestral practices, Sufism and mysticism. Richard Rohr once said, truth anywhere is truth everywhere. For me, inside of wisdom traditions and faith traditions, I’m looking for the voice of love. Where is love being expressed? Where is love leading? Where is truth being expressed?
You write that community is a pathway to healing. What’s an example?
Girls’ Nite Out is my sangha, which is a Buddhist term for community. This group has been together since 2012. We all came from the politeness of church spaces. We are a mix of races and ages, and these days, of religious and spiritual practices, marital statuses, sexual orientations. When we started together most women in the church did not have a space to be vulnerable. And when we sit at our table together surrounded by food and bottles of wine, there is nothing that is off limits. Each person gets a chance to talk about what’s going on in their life. There’s no judgment. There’s no correction. It can take us five, six hours of sharing. Outside of my marriage, it probably has been the safest place where I can bring the whole of who I am. That’s church to me.
What advice do you have for how church folks should engage with people who have deconstructed or left the church?
People often feel the need to defend, to be combative, to scapegoat, to blame. But we’re all on a journey. And you may stay in that church or belief system all of your life, and if you choose to do that, that’s you. The ones who feel invited to journey on or deconstruct, bless that, and let them go. Oftentimes we make life about ourselves even when it’s someone else’s experience. We think something can’t be true, because it’s not true for you. The advice I would have is to pause, be kind and remember this is not about you. Trust Love with that person, the same way you trust Love for you.
