Peeling Potatoes to the Glory of God

[lenora_rose]

This last week has not been productive. Not bad -- pleasant and fun things have happened, though work has done its damnedest to be dreary, and an ongoing eyestrain headache combo kept me from opening up my home computer much.

But very little was accomplished writing wise since the post I made coming down off the high of getting the big scene done. I did some work on the next bit, then realised I'd forgotten a most significant detail. So I'll have to rewrite even that little before I can declare myself accomplished.

I did get my faith statement done, and as of today, I am officially a member of Augustine and of the United Church of Canada. The ceremony was moving and affirming, and Colin was baptised (I pointed out to him that if one of us is responsible for really bringing the other back to this church thing, he convinced me). not everyone opted to speak their faith -- one man didn't, and one man sang instead. Colin had three sentences which said it all (There's a reason I write the novels, then go to him for help writing summaries.)



(In the ceremony itself, I changed a handful of words as I spoke, and checked the quote from Matthew with the woman doing today's reading, so we shared a translation. Their version is designed to be inclusive and sometimes sacrifices beauty for openness, and thus went to silly lengths to not use 'brethren' while still conveying the same point. Sigh.)

I walked away from Christianity many years ago, mainly because the religion seemed to me to express a deep intolerance for other points of view, to give a cold shoulder to any other vision of God, and to declare other moralities as wrong, or impossible.

I was aware that much of this intolerance was limited to a few particular branches of Christianity, and was not necessarily rooted in the Bible, or in the works of Jesus.

But in letting go of Christianity, I found I could not let go of God. I kept coming back to the fact that I believed in a divinity that cared for us and was merciful.

So I looked, mostly loosely and without any dedication, into other religions. For a while, I even followed a form of Neo-paganism – not Wicca itself – and looked at God in the shape of a Goddess of the Waters, since for me, the ocean is a source of inspiration and power, and it is the original source of life.

She did well enough, and I did some small works in her name, to help the lost and succour the wounded, of which I am still glad.

In the end, though, I found one problem with this path. Because I didn't follow the tenets of any existing faith, there was no moral law to look to for advice or assurance when both experience and the advice of friends failed me, and no spiritual advisor to tell me if I had begun to take the easy way because doing the right thing took too much effort. It also became more and more clear that the moral guide inside of me was born directly from the Christian ideal, and most particularly from the passage in Today's reading, "That which you have done to the least of these my brethren, you have done to me."

There was more than just that to my return to Christianity – the recognition of the Holy Spirit was another aspect. I have often felt guided by something that came from outside myself, sometimes in ways as loud as inspiration, sometimes a whisper, like a small bird over a thunderstorm. It has guided me in my art, and in my life choices, and I've always welcomed its arrival. I had never been taught anything about the Holy Spirit but that it existed, an unknown third part of the trinity. When it was finally described to me, I knew it had been with me all the while.

For me, the central tenets of Christianity are about giving from the self -- to other people, to the community, to the world. Giving mercy and forgiveness to those who have erred, and seeking justice for those who have none, teaching to those who want guidance. I do believe there is more than one way to serve, that my singing and my stories are part of God's work, that my aspiration to become a teacher is a part of God's plan.

But I still question myself, whether I am using my gifts to their fullest, or where I am neglecting some part of my duties as a Christian. And I have learned that, unless I stray from the path God has set for me, I will be - I should be - asking myself these questions for the rest of my life.

I am grateful to have the people of Augustine to help me in this lifelong search.