Harley Soltes
Nicole Roberts (left), Tyler Ives (center), Brennan Pebbles (second from right), and other Jesus-loving teens gather outside TORN.
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The sun is hanging low over the water at Alki Beach, casting streaks of pink and gray that sparkle off the waves as they crash into the sand. Guitar chords float over the crowd of teenagers who have gathered here on a Wednesday evening in late summer. • The area around them is littered with guitar cases and skateboards, as a 17-year-old named Jono stands and speaks over the quiet guitar riff.
"I don't know where you are in your walk with God right now, but if you have any doubts, just look at that," he says, turning and pointing at the now-glowing horizon. "Looking at that, there is no way there could be no God; there is no way scientists or whoever could be right about us being created from some blast in space. That should be all the proof you need."
Jono is a member of Skate Church, a West Seattle congregation that hosts youth-focused events ranging from skateboarding to rock concerts to paintball excursions. "We believe having fun is not a sin," says 20-year-old Pastor Brennan Pebbles, when asked what makes Skate Church different from most youth groups today.
Pebbles can be found most days at TORN, an Alaska Junction skate shop that doubles as Skate Church's sanctuary. The rectangular store has couches instead of pews, energy drinks and candy instead of coffee and doughnuts, and a drum set and several amps in its worship center. Pebbles wanted to create a place where teens would choose to come and hang out, and not just once a week. He believes "just coming together on Sundays is not church, because church should be something that is happening all the time." To keep the congregation coming back the rest of the week, the store also contains a PlayStation video game console, skating footage projected on a huge hanging screen, and skateboard decks and related paraphernalia for everyone to drool over and consider purchasing.
After bouncing from space to space for about five years in search of a place that would play host to their youthful vision, Skate Church's founding pastor, Serena Wastman (a parent of one of the youth congregants), hooked up with the open-minded Foursquare denomination, which agreed to help the congregation find a permanent home. Foursquare, which was founded by Aimee Semple McPherson in 1923, has a fairly tolerant faith doctrine, and church planting and missionary work are among its foremost goals.
On June 22, TORN opened its doors on California Avenue, selling skateboarding products at discount prices, thanks in no small part to the church's nonprofit status and all-volunteer staff. Here, name-brand skate decks go for up to $20 less than at the store's secular counterparts, and flyers advertise TORN as the best place for candy and energy drinks because the shop is "cheaper than 7-11...closer than Safeway."
"When I first walked in [to Skate Church], a bunch of different people were playing music," says 14-year-old Nicole Roberts. "Normally you think of church as a bunch of old people in pews, wearing their Sunday best, but you don't have to be that here; you just have to be normal."
"Normal" to Roberts apparently means the following: painting her right-hand nails Sharpie black and her left-hand nails Liquid Paper white; and wearing her hair in a choppy cut, dyed black on top and straightened so it falls strategically over her heavily made-up eyes. In fact, most of the teens at Skate Church hardly fit the "churchgoer" stereotype that you may be used to, at least on the outside.
Like the handful of churches that are experiencing youthful population growth right now, Skate Church is giving teens what they want: life answers, an accepting peer group, and plenty of energy drinks to boot. Says 16-year-old member Chris Redman, "When we started thinking about starting a church, skating was just starting to blow up, and we thought...kids will just, like, flock to us."
If this sounds like a church only a teenager could dream of, that's because it is. But while their alternative looks may suggest the sort of open-minded beliefs usually associated with the skating scene, chip away to Skate Church's conservative ideological core, and the whole pierced-eyebrow facade begins to look a lot like a classic bait and switch.
Among the photos that plaster the walls of TORN, one stands out. It shows a picture of a boy dressed like Marilyn Manson: the long hair, the piercings, the makeup, the black leather. The words next to this portrait read: "What is wrong with this picture?" Underneath that: "Absolutely nothing."
"Some people look at this kid and look only on the outside, and think, 'There must be something wrong with that,'" says Jono, pulling the picture down. "But you gotta look inside....[Other churches] are just really old-fashioned. They see if it's loud or black, then it must be evil. They don't look on the inside."
Youth pastor Pebbles goes on to explain Skate Church's cultural tolerance thusly: "Jesus says you should be in the world, but not of the world. We should be hanging out with the druggies on the street, but not like them. And sure, I love all the crazy music out there.If you start doing what the music says, though, that's another story."
