Today we’d like to introduce you to Melissa Maher.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Melissa. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I grew up in Baton Rouge, LA and moved to Houston in 2000 for a job in finance with a local bank. After four years in corporate banking, I made a brave decision to pursue a calling as a pastor, somewhat unusual as no one in my immediate family is employed by the church. However, as I made the journey through graduate school and four years of apprenticeship, I discovered inspiring stories of distant relatives who served their local communities by standing with those on the margins and advocating for justice and peace.
Two Methodist pastors, recent German immigrants to central Texas who were ministers during and after the Civil War, served as supply pastors in rural churches, sometimes crossing racial lines to serve in African American communities. A Dominican nun in New Orleans who as a young woman in the 1950’s traveled by pirogue (small boat) to bring home health care to Native American communities and years later endured the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. I share this history because I think there is something often hidden in our family roots that works its way through our blood and inspires generations to come.
I have now been a Methodist pastor for 10 years, serving with Mercy Street, a community within a network of churches at Chapelwood United Methodist. What initially drew me to a life of service continues to inspire me daily. If the church is not space where people can bring their questions and doubts and encounter the radical grace of God, then the church becomes a shell of an institution. I love serving the city of Houston as we respond with hope to the challenges of an opioid pandemic, lives impacted by sex trafficking and the roller-coaster ride of oil and gas prices.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
It’s definitely not been a smooth road but I suppose that’s the gift. Too often we try to numb the disappointment or cope with stress in ways that isolate us from others. So to be a part of a community like Mercy Street where anyone can bring their hopes and fears; joy and pain; celebrations and mess ups, that’s pure gift.
For me personally, I have struggled my entire adult life with depression and anxiety. It was not until my early 30’s when I found a combination of counseling, medication and peer support to help me. Unfortunately, Sometimes the church or people in the church want to suggest mental illness is a sign of a lack of faith. Or the abuse of alcohol, drugs, food, work or relationships as a sign of moral failing.
If you believed, prayed or trusted God more, things will get better. You could beat your addiction. Too often I walk alongside families after their loved one succumbs to the disease of addiction or mental illness and see this indictment as harmful and, I believe, wholly uncharacteristic of the love and grace of God.
So being able, to tell the truth, and not hide in our shadows actually becomes the way we step into a place of recovery and restoration. This is why every Saturday night we have an open-mic time where anyone can celebrate the radical grace of God—30 days sober, one year in SLAA, a new job, compliant on medication for bipolar disorder, new baby or a belly-button birthday—we celebrate it all!
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Mercy Street – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
When you come on Saturday nights to Mercy Street, you’ll see business executives and folk in-between jobs, a young professional and a young adult in treatment. We’re cool if you’ve been in the back of a cop car or if you drive a cop car. Part of a family, struggling to raise teenagers or just got out of a tough relationship.
We believe a different kind of community forms when what normally separates us, draws us into a space of curiosity about another. So we’re a vibrant tribe of Republicans, Democrats, Independents; Texan fans and Cowboy fans, two days sober and never touched a drink. Documented and undocumented, introverted, never met a stranger, worn out and energized. —we’ve got a seat for you.
Here’s a piece I wrote about Mercy Street:
“Would you be willing to go see Straight Outta Compton with me?” This brief conversation during the opening worship set might be one of my favorite moments of welcome and belonging. Beyond the obvious (all good things begin with hip-hop), this invitation from a woman in our community signaled to me—this woman is at home. She feels accepted and free to extend acceptance to others.
I suppose this is one of the desires of the human heart—to be welcomed and accepted by others into a movement larger than the limits of our individual lives. After our service, one night, an addict in the community came forward with a look of resolve and humility. He shared his initial reaction to my role as his pastor was a struggle. He had never had a female pastor before and, to make the transition even harder, I was not from the traditional 12-step community. He acknowledged he was willing to hold back judgment and move towards acceptance because he could see that I have my own struggles and strengths.
He appreciated my openness from the beginning that I would be a student of the traditions and formation of the 12-step community, while not discrediting my call and purpose in the community. Our conversation gave me the opportunity to say “thank you” and affirm his struggle and welcome his voice as one that could teach me. And there it was—room for each of us to be fully who God had created and is creating us to be. So, at one level, I think that is what acceptance is—making room for the other while not dismissing our unique voice.
I’ve witnessed acceptance in our community in the weekly welcome of a man who had been homeless for over a decade. The community lovingly, consistently extended the extravagant gifts of eye contact and calling him by name. Now, when I see him walk through the halls with his head held high and he is encouraging others to grab seven cookies (instead of the highly recommended two), I can’t help but swell with gratitude to serve as pastor in a community which calls for everyone to “come as they are”—spiritually, emotionally, psychologically and physically.
The beauty of acceptance happens often in the quiet, seemingly ordinary moments of community. Only the hidden, persistent extension of radical friendship and hospitality, which Jesus extended to those in the shadows and those basking in the spotlight (the woman hemorrhaging and the deceitful tax collector) and those between the cracks and those on top of the power structures (the man born blind and the wife of Herod’s estate manager), can generate and sustain the holy practice of acceptance.
Jean Vanier, the founder of l’Arche communities, which provide a community for those with and without intellectual abilities, says this about acceptance, “If we see only the gifts and beauty, then we expect too much of people; we idealize them. If we only see the wound, then we do too much for them and tend to keep them in submission.” Acceptance is to welcome beauty and pain in one another. Our role is as a community of Christ is to not label or define or change.
Our call, modeled in the life of Jesus, is to accept the other as they are—pulling them out of denial or shame. Yet acceptance or making room for the other is not to leave them where they are. Our role and invitation to carry on the radical grace of Christ is to extravagantly accept others in the midst of their journey and to share our experience, strength and hope with them. For who knows, it could be in the sacred space of making a room that we truly hear our voice for the first time. It may even sound a little bit like O’Shea Jackson, Sr. or Eric Wright.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
We are a part of a network of churches within Chapelwood United Methodist Church. We are the oldest of the children (celebrating 21 years as a community in 2018). Two emphases for us will shape this coming year:
First, we want to be a community that welcomes anyone returning to Houston after serving time in prison. We believe there is life beyond the sentence and mercy after justice. This isn’t a new program we are starting; it’s who we are. This calling to be a place of welcome comes out of the individuals in our community who have embraced hope that the worst things are never the last things.
Second, we are looking for ways to help men and women find employment with a living wage. We started a small coffee shop in 2016 as a way to create. We were super proud of starting the business and hiring one employee. And, then we failed—ran out of money and had to close the business in 2017. So, we will continue to take creative risks to create jobs or find sustainable and safe housing Sure, it means along the way we may fail in a project or two but we discover that God is always working towards something new.
Contact Info:
- Address: 11140 Greenbay Street
Houston, TX 77024 - Website: www.mercystreet.org
- Phone: 713-354-4487
- Email: melissa@mercystreet.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mercystreethou/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mercystreethouston/
Image Credit:
Robin Dickey
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