by William Burks
Kelly Fryer and Tana Kjos, the newly commissioned pastoral leaders of Christ the King Lutheran Church and partners in life, led worship last Sunday in the church's new summer home at the J. Ira & Nicki Harris Family Hostel on East Congress Parkway. Filling a second-floor meeting room at the hostel, about 30 worshipers sang to the music of Kevin Cline's jazz trio, prayed and celebrated Holy Communion.
Fryer delivered what the service leaflet called a 'Sermon & Dreaming Out Loud,' asking the question, 'Who Do Your Friends Say Jesus Is?' and describing something of her own faith journey beginning with listening to her Aunt Jen pray aloud at her bedside 'for me and for people who really needed prayers,' such as the hungry, orphans, the sick and for all of Fryer's family. 'I want to know the Jesus that my Aunt Jen knew,' Fryer said.
Projecting bumper-sticker slogans about Jesus from a laptop onto the room's front wall, she described the variety of reactions suggested by the phrases, from 'JesUSAves,' to 'I Found Jesus—He was behind the sofa all along.' Fryer plans to reacquaint her congregation with Jesus over the summer, taking as her tongue-in-cheek theme, 'Jesus: the ( Real ) Flavor of Love.'
Christ the King Lutheran Church, founded in 1955, has always been a 'church without walls,' Fryer said, and moved to the Chicago hostel after needing to vacate its previous location at Old St. Mary's Catholic Church. Fryer, whose ministry has focused on renewing and redefining churches, moved to Chicago last fall, having served as assistant professor of congregational leadership at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minn., since 2004.
She spoke privately after the service about the changes in her life that led her to the position at Christ the King: 'When I got to that point where I was able to just be honest with myself about my sexuality, I knew that I had two choices: I could either stay and fight—and many pastors are choosing to do that, and I honor that decision—or I could just resign from the Roster of ordained ministers. And that was the choice that I made.'
She said the reason for her choice was because 'the same things that have always been important to me in ministry are still important to me, namely, to figure out how to do church and be church in a new way in this new culture. And I was really afraid that if I stayed and fought this battle [ over being openly lesbian in the ministry ] I would be unable to do that work. You know, that that would be the only thing everybody would hear, and they wouldn't hear all this other stuff, which I think people really need to hear.'
As a result, she feels enabled to continue 'in creative new ways try to get out the message about the God who really loves, with no walls, no lines … and that's what I'm trying to do.'
Living with Kjos and their children in the Loop, they attended Christ the King Church, which lost its previous pastor at the end of last year. The parish was able to finesse the ban on openly gay clergy by naming them 'pastoral leaders' with the full support of the Chicago Metropolitan Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ( ELCA ) bishop. So far, her new ministry has 'been a blast,' she said.
Fryer's fame in the ECLA for thinking about new ways of 'doing church' is reinforced by her being invited to be the plenary session speaker at the Chicago Metropolitan Synod's 21st Annual Synod Assembly Fri., June 6.
Christ the King plans a summertime of varied worship settings, including an outdoor service and pet blessing Sun., June 22, and participation in Chicago's Pride Parade Sun., June 29. The church will sponsor a table at the Printer's Row Book Fair Sat.-Sun., June 7-8. Information about the church and its ministries is online at www.chicagolooplutherans.com .
