This morning, I went to church.

I know, I know. It's a miracle and all that. But while I'm not a member of any church, I do attend services with the local Unitarian branch and among my New Year's resolutions was one to attend more often. It's the end of January. I've been twice in 2007. Pretty good, huh?!

Like most Unitarian chapters, this one meets in a local elementary school. Unitarians are generally a homeless group, always hoping for a permanent structure but generally congregating in the gymnasiums of schools. The altar, really just a table with a pretty drape across it and candles atop it, chairs and song books are all packed away each week. Likely stashed in a members' garage, awaiting the next Sunday's services. The folding chairs upon which we sit are packed up and hung up by the congregation at the end of each service.

After years attending church in behemoths, bedecked in stunning stained glass, highly polished wood and sometimes marble accents - buildings that were artworks in themselves - I sort of like this temporary arrangement. I also like the fact that I am not a member, nor am I required to be. Membership, the requirement to belong, harkens back to my Catholic days. And though I feel connected and drawn to the Unitarian beliefs and the types of people it draws, I like this sense of being able to flit in and out, no strings attached, no one frowning upon you because of your refusal to conform.

That is why so many of us are there in the first place. We do not conform to other religions. We are not sure where we fit in. We are either misfits or proud rebels. Or something between the two.

At any rate, this morning I went to church.

Our regular pastor takes one weekend a month off. Today was that day and in her place, a visiting Presbyterian minister led the service. She was tall and regal in bearing, with silvery white hair and a pretty face. And she was furious.

Furious, she said, because she had dedicated her life to helping victims of slavery and those seeking to survive in the wake of genocide in the Sudan. She had helped to found a missionary group that brought these people food, water and medical help. She was furious, she said, because there were so few volunteers, so few trying to help so many.

"How is it," she said, "that we get so caught up in our daily lives that we forget about our fellow humans?

"How is it that what's on sale at Wal-Mart, or what's going on on 'Desperate Housewives,' is more important than that?"

Her eyes blazed.

As she spoke, photos of the people she'd met flashed behind her. They were no different than the ones you've seen on TV countless times. Black faces. Children. Men. Women. Some wretched, some angry, some who stared into the camera with distrust, others with pride. Then there were those who smiled, whose faces shone with a happiness that elevated them above their plight.

"Imagine," she said, "your 11-year-old son losing his toes to leprosy, and the sight of a dark line on his hand, the indication of another infection beginning. Imagine being helpless to stop it."

I did imagine. Or tried to. But I could not see Robby in such a situation. Nevertheless, I was on the verge of tears.

She introduced scenario after scenario, beginning them all with the word, "Imagine." As she went on, her voice rose with emotion.

I heard her words, saw the pictures she painted, understood her anger and felt ashamed of my normal, American life. My quest for happiness, my endless pursuit of a mate, the self pity I allowed, the tears I cried for myself on a soft bed, in a warm apartment, inches from a refrigerator packed with food, a working toilet, hot and cold water.

Yet, I felt anger stir within me for another reason. I felt angry with her for what I felt were her attempts to shame us into action, to make us hang our heads in self-disgust and do what Americans do best when seeing such suffering: Open their checkbooks and write.

This evening, my emotions remain mixed. I admire her passion and determination, not only to change things herself but to startle us into action, to make us look beyond our suburban lives to a world we could scarcely imagine.

And part of me understood. Because more and more often, I feel the need to do more, to make some sort of difference. I feel the deep-seated need I suspect we all have to focus on something other than ourselves, other than our families, to leave the world a better place than when we entered it. Perhaps this grows as we mature. At 62, she believes this is her calling. She believes she can change the world.

My strength falls short of hers. Or perhaps my personality is just different.

Part of the reason I took this seemingly strange job selling Medicare insurance was because it helps people, something big-city journalism seemed not to do. And hey, as I've discovered, the money ain't bad either. All of the reason I volunteered as a Depression/Bipolar Support Group leader was to give what I could to people whose pain I knew.

But on both these efforts, I fall short.

i question this job already at times because of its effect on me, the sadness that I see daily. Sadness that I often cannot just observe, but absorb. I've opted not to resume my volunteer work with the Depression/Bipolar Support Group here in Denver because I do not think I can do it, that my emotional bank is full by the work day's end. That I cannot absorb anymore.

I question, too, whether this way of thinking is correct, or whether I can lift myself up by continuing to give instead of retreating from it. I even question why it matters how I feel, that helping others is bigger than me. This, I think, is what today's Pastor Heidi believes.

Yet I believe, in fact am certain, that only healthy people can help heal the unhealthy. That we all must start with ourselves first, selfish as it sounds, before we can do jack for others. And that raising a child to be a compassionate adult is its own gift to the world.

Too, that like the smiling people in those photos, we're here to find joy in life, that sacrificing yourself is as much an insult to whatever creator we have as turning your back from others completely.

So for today, I'll do what I am best posed to. I'll get out a stamp and an envelope. I'll open my purse. And I'll write Pastor Heidi a check.