Dairy Of Church.

I have been many versions of a church girl.

I have been one who woke up early on Sundays because church was a certainty, a non-negotiable. The one who memorized Bible verses for the one reward of a traveling box I used for all of university, and a round of applause; the usual warmth of approval. I was that child who knew how to lift her hands during worship, who understood when to kneel, when to say amen and when to close her eyes tight enough to convince the world she was deep in prayer. The one who had all choir uniforms as a teenager, singing in a voice that felt too small for the bigness of God, until one day, I wrote a letter and resigned from the choir. Nobody asked why. Maybe nobody noticed. But I left.

My mother had her church. My father had his, and some Sundays, we had no choice but to go where the head of the house wanted. Then there were the endless thanksgivings at various relatives churches sometimes Anglican, sometimes Catholic, sometimes a small gathering in a neighborhood I had never been to.

I lived with Aunty Angela in FESTAC for three months, and with her, church was not just on Sundays. Early morning masses were mandatory, and I found myself waking up before dawn, attending Catholic services almost daily. At first, it was unfamiliar, but it wasn’t completely strange as most of my extended family was Catholic. Later, when I loved a man who was Catholic, it all felt like a full circle moment. I had already been there. I had already studied their prayers, their rituals, their reverence. I had already traced my fingers over rosary beads, read books on saints, whispered countless Hail Marys.

Maybe I had a curious mind, or maybe God kept introducing me to faith in different ways, but while I was with Aunty Angela, I also became fascinated by her Jewish neighbor. There was something about his faith that intrigued me, and I spent time reading about them too. Their history, their customs, the way they held onto their beliefs. Very interesting people.

Church was never just one thing for me. It was the Yoruba church in Oke-Ayo’s Path Restorer Ministries where Mommy Landlady ensured that my siblings and I never missed weekly services. It was a full-blown Yoruba church, and we had no choice but to adapt. We learned to read the Yoruba Bible, to sing worship songs in a language that felt foreign at first but eventually became second nature. Even now, I know an unbelievable number of Yoruba church songs. It was necessary. We had to go to church.

Church was my one and only university roommate, who went to a white garment church. Living with her meant learning another way to worship. Their annual thanksgiving was an event, full of color and singing and dancing, and I joined in. I even participated in their FYB Sunday, dressing up, stepping into their world for a moment.

Church was also the woman who started a church right behind our house. My mother’s face would squeeze in silent disapproval whenever the extremely loud midnight prayers started, voices constantly rising into the night, unrelenting. Lmao. Your people mommy, your people.

Church was always around me. In different forms, in different languages, in different expressions of faith.

I have been the girl who cried in church. Not the dramatic, fall-on-your-knees kind of crying, but the silent tears, the ones you wipe quickly before anyone sees. The kind of crying that happens when a song touches a wound you thought had healed. When a sermon sounds too much like your story. When you sit in the back, just trying to hold yourself together, but something about that room makes you unravel. I have cried because I was overwhelmed with life. I have cried because I felt God was speaking directly to me. I have cried because I wanted to feel Him but didn’t.

I have been hurt in church. Not by God, but by people who claimed to speak for Him. I have been welcomed with open arms and turned away. I have been rejected from a choir, not because my voice wasn’t good enough, but because my wardrobe wasn’t. I have learned that church can be home, but it can also be a place that reminds you why you left home in the first place.

I have loved a pastor before.

I have left churches, started over, and left again. I have doubted, I have questioned, I have wrestled with belief. But I have also found God in quiet places, outside of the noise, beyond the sermons. In whispers, in prayers, in unexpected moments.

I have rediscovered prayers not as a ritual, not as a duty, but as something sacred. A conversation, a place of safety. I have learned to talk to God in my own way, without performance, without fear of getting it wrong.

I am no model churchgoer. I do not have a perfect attendance record. I am here. And there. And sometimes nowhere at all. But I have arrived at something.

I am in the best place now.

And maybe that journey through all the churches, all the traditions, all the lessons had a lot to do with it.

No matter where I find myself, no matter how much I question or how far I stray, I could never truly let go of the things church has put in me. The prayers, the songs, the way I know to turn to God when everything else fails. It eats in me too deep. I could never walk away from Him. No matter what.

I am still here and there in my mind sometimes, but church? Church is a necessary thing for me.