To a Secular Friend: This is what I wanted to say

Disclaimer: This post is not aimed any one person, or group of people. I have written it first person to second person because it felt appropriate for what I wanted to say in the piece. The 'you' in this piece is a representative figure, and I understand these generalisations may not be representative of you and your beliefs.

It's been a good evening so far. We're at a house party, probably, or maybe just all out together for coffee or drinks or a film, and chances are we've probably had a drink or too (caffeine or booze). Conversation is flowing and everyone is getting on well, and somehow, we find we're talking about religion. It gets dropped in by accident, and you all say ordinary, acceptable kind of things about rationality and reason and tolerance, about it being very well in its proper place.

You almost certainly know that I'm a Christian. You probably know that I'm a Catholic because I like to joke about it, and you also know that on most things I think the same way as the rest of our set. We're casually left-wing art students with casually left-wing views. So you're not expecting it when I tell you that I'm pro-life (even though I give it heavy disclaimers, mostly so you don't associate me with extremists). You're not expecting it when I talk about living in a world with a real, tangible devil, or when I describe a book I'm reading for class as blasphemous. You can't believe that I'm saying these things because somehow these aren't the views of our set, our world, our friends. And yet I'm sitting in front of you. I'm drinking real ale, we've been talking about how to make the socialist utopia come about for the last half-hour, and I have just casually mentioned believing in the Immaculate Conception. Way to make things awkward, I can see you thinking.

There's a particular look in people's eyes when you mention these things. A kind of embarrassment, sometimes with a flash of anger, sometimes disbelief, but mostly just confusion. If you're clearly too embarrassed to talk about it, I make a joke about it and steer us back onto safe waters. But sometimes we do talk about it. And here things get interesting.

The first thing I want you to know, in this conversation, is that I am a rational, thinking person who has arrived at her faith logically and constantly evaluates her beliefs. This is probably the reason why I have started gabbling on about Canon Law or the schisms of the Early Church. You probably don't care, but please bear with me. I'm attempting to prove that I don't live on cloud cuckoo land, and that we can have a rational debate about this where I will understand your points and respect them. One thing I have found is that a lot of people assume that as a Christian talking to a non-believer, my initial response will be judgement, or attempted conversion. They assume that I cannot imagine a world beyond my brainwashed ideology and will not be able to talk about my faith on a theoretical level. I hope very much that they are wrong, because talking about my faith theoretically seems to be the only way to get people to respect it. The language of faith is increasingly alien, and the only way to make headway in conversations, like this one we're having now, is to translate it into academic concepts that we can detach from our instinctive emotional reactions. This also means that we're less likely to ruin our friendship arguing over determinism at 2.30am.

The problem is that I'm trying to prove myself by presenting faith in secular terms for a secular world, and increasingly, I feel that as a person of faith, I am living in a different world to people without. The mechanics of my world are different; yours runs on 'Science', whereas 'science', in mine, is just a part of the machinery, a descriptor of the divine whole. Last term I took a module on one of my favourite types of fiction, Gothic Literature, and in class we had some fantastic and broad-ranging debates about interpretations and world-views, of ideologies and sub-text, but somehow there was one ideology that only seemed to be visible to me: the idea that the monsters could be real. Even though you can discuss this as a theoretical concept, you can't really imagine it, because in your world God is dead. But not for me. For me, we are in the middle of a cosmic battle between good and evil, a battle declared won in the transformation of bread and wine where times touch and the victory is at hand. I live in a cyclic time marked by festivals moving us through the journey of our faith, through the agonies of sin and pain to redemption and glory. I believe in miracles and angels and visions, and even though I can discuss rationally the influence of medieval superstition or pre-Christian thought on the development of my faith I am still an alien to you when I talk about this world.

Alien. Aliens, especially religious ones, threaten you and the secular balanced world you believe in. The game at the moment seems to be divide and rule; turn us against each other, especially minorities or people whose lifestyles or beliefs go against the cultural norm, wait for retaliation, then play the blame game. So we're fighting on two fronts; we're fighting against the extremists who give faith a bad name at the same time as fighting for our faith to be taken seriously. And this is terrifying. If a commentator risks telling you that they cannot say #JeSuisCharlie because they find Charlie Hebdo's disrespect towards Islamic beliefs callous and offensive, then they risk being identified with the evil committed on that day. It's like this on a smaller scale when we talk. I want to prove that I am rational and intelligent, but I also want to stand up for my faith, which in your eyes, does not belong to the rational and intelligent world. How can I do both? In the end we drop the conversation and go home, wishing it had never been mentioned.

I want you to understand how much it hurts sometimes, trying to be a person of faith in your world. When you take the name of my Lord in vain, it's like you're using the name of my kid or one of my parents as a slur, except it's worse, because you are being offensive about someone I love more than I will ever love any person. I want to stand up for my faith and tell you to stop, but I also want to let you say what you will because I don't want to suppress your rights to free speech. When I was in my teens I thought that any conversation on faith could be 'won' by just providing better and better arguments, but these days, I'm more convinced that the only victory is that the conversation ends on a note of respect. I've acknowledged that your beliefs have a sound basis, and that I can respect your right to have them, and you have done the same for me. It's not exactly Preaching The Gospel, but I don't believe that anyone ever comes to faith through arguments. If we're arguing, I am not trying to convert you. I just want to talk.

Yes, I do want you to become a Christian. It would be strange if I didn't. But in this conversation I just want to talk honestly about faith. If we're in a seminar I want to show you an academic perspective that it has opened up for me. If we're talking teleology in the pub or 17th century politico-religious symbolism at 2am, then I want to talk about teleology or religio-politico-symbolio-ism. Just that. But more than that, I don't just want your tolerance of my faith, your awkward permission to believe it ('But...'). I want your respect.

God's Hat

If you've been following the news today (13.03.2013) you'll know that the Catholic Church has just elected a new Pope, to replace the emeritus Pope Benedict, who in February took the brave, and controversial, decision to retire due to ill health. Pope Francis I is from Argentina, and thus the first non-European Pope in a thousand years. The rather fun Pontifficator game on the Guardian website describes him as moderate, a social champion open to relationships with other faiths and with some progressive stances, although he has previously spoken against homosexual marriages, as have many of the Cardinals. But you know this, if you've been following the news, and if you've been following this blog (I flatter myself that you have...!) you'll know this isn't the first post I've written about Catholicism; in October last year I wrote about attending Mass at university, despite having just become a committed member of the United Reformed Church. 

Things have moved on for me since then. Coming back after Christmas, with the Youth Assembly of the United Reformed Church ahead and a wonderful visit to my home church behind, I decided to look for a United Reformed Church in my university town. One church in particular had been recommended to me, so one freezing, snowy morning, I headed out across the city to the 9.45 am service. One later bus and underestimated walk later, and (an hour after I started) I reached the church, late but happy. For a few weeks I attended services there, and I really wanted this to be the right place. I told the people there that it was the right place, told them I'd come back, and tried to convince myself that it was. But I knew, somewhere, that it wasn't right. The people were lovely, offering me lifts and looking after me, the music was fantastic, and it was obviously a lovely community of people dedicated to worshipping God. I didn't really get on with the preaching, but as several churches in the area are sharing one rather over-stretched minister, just to have a service at all in the weeks when he was elsewhere is an achievement. I meant to email them and thank them for their kindness, but the moment past, and now I think it's too late, but I am grateful.

When God calls you, there's only so long you can ignore him, and on Ash Wednesday, I started listening.

I've been ashed every Ash Wednesday that I remember. It's an integral part of my life, part of the rhythm of my year, like Christmas and birthdays and the start of the holidays. On Ash Wednesday I planned to go to Mass at the chaplaincy, purely for convenience - although I think I already knew this would be decisive. If it went well, I'd go back. 

Instead it went badly.

I decided to collect my post before Mass, but set off too late, leaving only a few minutes before the post room shuts. Instead of giving in, I cycled as fast as I could up the university drive, collected my post, and had a combined asthma attack/panic attack on the floor of the chaplaincy building. It was spectacularly undignified, and a little scary, as I didn't have any asthma medication. The lovely Catholic chaplain looked after me, and made me a cup of tea whilst I lay on the floor, breathing into my hands. By the time Mass itself came around, I felt almost normal, if a little shaky. 

Sometimes we need to be shaken up.

As Mass went on that evening, I felt calmer and calmer. I felt like I'd come home, a feeling I'd also felt when I found my Church at home (which is United Reformed). A prodigal daughter, I returned to my mother Church, a Church I was baptised and raised in, rejected, hated, and dissociated myself with. Often people tell me God is full of surprises, but the God I know doesn't just surprise people - he plays practical jokes as well...

I started going back to Mass. Then earlier this week, the Catholic society, of which I am a nominal member (I haven't paid my subs yet. Oops) started advertising for committee members for the next year. During Mass on Sunday I had a sense - or perhaps, even, a calling - that I should apply. Ever shy until spoken to, I hovered around after the Mass, hoping someone would ask me if I was interested. They did. I don't want to say more because there's no guarantee that I'll get a role, but I'm hopeful. Praying about it over the last few days, I've realised I'd be prepared to commit to the Cathsoc, which also means committing to Catholicism, and embracing that part of my identity. Above all, I am a Christian, I am someone trying to follow Jesus, to love God, to act in the Holy Spirit, but I'm also a Catholic. Those words still sound strange, but at the moment, they also sound right. 

This post has been for me. I know it won't interest many people, although I hope a few people read it, and enjoy it, but sometimes just writing is important, and I don't keep a diary any more. If you've got this far, thank you. I won't keep you much longer.

I've been trying to pray for people during Lent, as I struggle to understand prayer, and I have also been praying for a deeper understanding of prayer. How praying for other people makes a difference has always puzzled me, and as I've tried to pray, an understanding - not in clear words, but something outside of myself, something right, came to me. A reminder to trust God, and a reminder that as he touches us, we can touch him, if we open our hearts to him. 

And in that personal journey, God has reached me through the Catholic church. The theological differences I have with the Church - transubstatiaton, the Hail Mary, women priests, celibacy of priests, the rosary, the apocrypha, the attitude towards condoms - these things haven't lost their importance, but they aren't the be all and end all in the way they were when I was thirteen and loudly denouncing Catholicism as heretics, or whatever nonsense I said at the time. Theologically, the United Reformed Church is where I stand, and where my membership will stay. But in this moment, this place in my life, I know I am called to be a Catholic. It's confusing, and strange, but also wonderful, and to me, these things together look like God's fingerprints. 

It's not about denominations, of course. Whether you're Catholic or Anglican or Methodist or Pentecostal or Baptist or Orthodox or United Reformed - or, I'm not afraid to say it, Muslim or Jewish or any other person of faith, to have a faith and follow it is wonderful. There's a story I always remember from a 'book of wisdom stories' in my Mum's study. Although it's probably plagiarism to write it up here - without the book, I can't cite it - the gist of it goes like this:

God, looking down at the earth, sees a group of workers in a field, and decides to play a practical trick on them, maybe to amuse them or make them think, so he walks through the field wearing a hat with four sides. One is yellow, one white, one green, one red.

When he's gone, the workers realise they've seen God, and eventually fall to discussing the colour of his hat.

'It was white!' says one worker.

'No,' the second disagrees, 'it was green.'

'You're both blind!' chips in the third, 'it was definitely yellow.'

'You fools!' says the last, 'didn't you see God's hat was red?'

And instead of sharing the miracle of seeing God in the field, they fall to arguing about the colour of his hat. It makes God sad. 

The idea isn't that God is a trouble maker, by the way, (although the tower of Babel story is more than a little playful!) but that God shows us all different sides of himself, perhaps to allow us to cope with his infinity, but instead of learning from each other, we argue about who is right. It's a metaphor I find useful personally, being an interchurch child, confirmed ecumenically, and torn between different denominations. Being interchurch is difficult, but sometimes you see wonderful things, God looked at through different lenses. None of them show the whole, but I learn more. If only we could all come to together and worship together for a day. If we managed it, without just fighting, imagine what we could do...

And tonight we have a new Pope, a man who according to his Guardian profile, is open to dialogue with other faiths, who is about to take on leadership of the biggest faith group in the world. If you have a faith, no matter what, please pray for him tonight. 

J.R.

*I want to mention that whilst I've used 'he' in conjunction with 'God' in this blog, that is only because English has no neutral pronoun, so 'he' is the convenient, as its traditional usage makes it invisible. Believing that both genders represent God, it bugs me to gender God in my writing, but unfortunately language is only an inadequate representation of reality. Apparently. This is the kind of thing you say a lot in university level English literature. 

 

And so, to Mass

If you'd rather not read all this, but are interested in praying/being prayed for, please skip to the bottom! 

If you'd told me, a month ago, that I would become a part of the Catholic community at university, I would have laughed at you. Maybe, I would have said, but that's not my thing. I mean, it's nice to go once a year, for old times sake, but I'm a Protestant. A member of the URC church. I'm going to find a URC church somewhere in Norwich, first Sunday, and I'm going to enjoy being a dissenter for a bit. Also, I'm going to join the Socialists. (Yeah...that didn't happen. I've never met people who so strongly resembled zombies before...)

The problem with that plan was that it seems God has his own plan for my life. Sometimes I doubt that God is doing things in my life, because it's easy to doubt when you think you have everything sorted, and you're in control. Yet this week has shown me, more than ever, that God is helping me out and guiding me. If this new path hadn't been so surprising, I might not have noticed it. How many times has God done this for me, I wonder? Corny as it might be, I've spent the last few days thinking back to that 'Footsteps in the Sand' poem, and wondering if right now, God is carrying me. I'm trying to manage so many different things, learning to run my own life for the first time, and I have a thousand things to organise and worry about, yet I feel strangely content, even peaceful.It's illogical; I am always worried and stressed. It only makes sense in the knowledge that God is helping me out massively at the moment, carrying me and all the baggage that comes with being a new university student so that I can cope. Tonight's homily (sermon/talk) in Mass was on thankfulness, and tonight, I feel like I understand how much I have to be thankful for. I'm just not sure I have the words to express it.

But I've kept you waiting to hear about this surprise, the sudden new direction God seems to be sending you on. 

I may be going back to Catholicism. 

I say may because, as I'm finding is usual for plans the Big Man's had a hand in, it is almost impossible to predict what is going to happen next. This might just be a temporary thing to help me get through the first few weeks of university. It might be forever. All I can do is trust and hope.

But why should this be so surprising? I've already told you that I'm a member or the URC - the United Reformed Church - but my relationship with denominations has been a complicated one. As an adult Christian, I've found my place in liberal, free church Protestantism, but when I was brought up ecumenically. I was baptised jointly in the Catholic Church, and the Church of England, in a shared service, and brought up as an equal member of both churches. Incidentally, I understand mine was the first baptism of this kind, ever. They're not common; my parents and the Association of Interchurch Families (AIF) worked really hard to bring it about and make it feasible. People still disbelieve me when I explain it, but it's true. To add to the complication, when I was fourteen I was confirmed through our Local Ecumenical Partnership, becoming a full member of the Church of England (or, the Anglian communion), the Methodist Church, the Baptist Church, and the United Reformed Church, a move which effectively annulled my baptismal membership of the Catholic Church. Then a year ago, I moved to my local United Reformed Church and became a local member there, and in that Church community I believe I have found where I belong. When I moved there I was spiritually tired. I needed to receive rather than give for a while, and I know God guided me there for a reason. They've encouraged me and supported me in my faith and my personal life, and helped me slowly become an active part of the church again, helping out with an early morning toddler service. 

To cut through the religious jargon: Some churches get on and some don't. They believe in most of the same things, but belonging to more than one is often considered paradoxical, because of their minute differences. Some of us ignore these differences and do it anyway. One of my friends called me 'a mongrel of religion'...I think that sums it up accurately.

So why, after effectively removing myself from the Catholic Church years ago in my early teens am I once again wrestling with it? My relationship with the Catholic church has not been easy. As a child, I thought that Mass was boring, because it had no Sunday school, and this led to my desire to quit Mass as soon as I could, only attending when I was forced to go. I was still a regular church goer, attending protestant services on Sunday morning, so until now I never thought of it as 'leaving church'. I never understood why young people drop out of church till now, thinking retrospectively. I don't blame myself; Mass is not designed for children! 

As a young teenager, I became conscious of the divisions between the Catholic church and the protestant churches. Issues like the ordination of women became important to me, and I realised that the little theology I'd worked out for myself fitted on the Protestant side of things. Within a year or two, I became and angry teenage ex-Catholic. I was angry. How could they be so stupid, and so obviously wrong? I wanted to correct everyone who had made the mistake of being Catholic. I was rude, and it stills hurts me to think of the nasty things I said to good Catholics at the time, at school and in my family. The teenage brain is not programmed for empathy, according to the BBC news, and I was in that respect typical.

But alongside all this burgeoning teenage angst, I was trying to find an adult faith of my own, working things out. A few months after my confirmation, at 14 years old, I had an experience that changed how I think and understand God forever.

I won't go into details here. Let's simply say that I had a private experience of the numinous. I told people at the time and I was ridiculed, which I perfectly understand, so I'm saving that event for my own prayers, and encouragement when I'm struggling. Strangely enough, it happened in a little URC chapel, downstairs from the conference house I'd been staying in (On a Methodist course...). I think this is important. Maybe it's a coincidence, but I'm wondering now if God is saying to me, you can find me in the United Reformed Church. By which I don't mean that the URC has a monopoly on God, but that I specifically am meant to be a URC member. 

At the same time, I was at a Catholic school, and enjoying being the one person who refuses to say the Hail Mary in class. Small rebellions are the source of endless pleasure as a teenager! 

Yet the last few years, things have begun to change. Having identified everything I dislike about the Catholic Church, and more importantly, found a place where I can be comfortable and develop on my own faith, I've begun to find my attitude to the Catholic Church changing. It started with a supportive priest, the realisation that going to Mass with my school and taking communion with them was important to me, and a grudging respect for Catholic moral authority. I'm not sure I agree with everything the Vatican says, or the contents of the Catholic Church Catechism, but more and more I find myself respecting the moral teachings of the church, with its sound, loving ground, and turning to it for guidance. After all, it is the bedrock of a third of the world's population, and the morality of the western legal system. You have to respect something that has commanded that degree of authority. 

But it's more than respect, more than acceptance of our differences. At Mass, I find a reverence for God, a sheer state of adoration, that is rare in any other denomination. (Although I think my home church do it pretty well!). There are times when I want to be quiet, to reach out to God in my heart, and to think on how wonderful and awesome he is, and this is so apparent in the majesty of the Mass service. Catholicism, at heart, is simply beautiful. You can criticise it's teachings or policies however much you like, but the beauty is always there, shining through. 

And Mass on campus is something special. For the first time, I'm going to Mass with a group of energised young Catholics who care about their faith, and we have an excellent priest who preaches the most brilliant sermons. I've been twice and loved it, coming back feeling more in touch with God from each one. I've also made it to an ecumenical church once, and tried but failed to make it to a URC church this morning, so it's not just laziness that draws me back to the on campus service. Even when I find a protestant church of my own, I'm going to stay a Mass goer, which I suppose will make me a two-service a day girl... Don't bash me with your bibles or anything, right? 

From one angle, it sounds like the Prodigal Son story, but the truth is that whilst I am returning to the security of my childhood church, the church which has come to mean safety and reassurance to me, I'm not renouncing anything I've done since, or going backwards. On the contrary, to grow in my adult faith I need to belong to a church which is nearer to my particular beliefs, and in which I can participate fully - hopefully a United Reformed Church, although I'm open to any of the denominations I belong to! But I'm glad to have made my peace with the Catholic Church, and I think there's more to come from our brief encounter. God is doing something, sending me to Mass at the very time when I'm attempting to make a new start in my life. I look forward to finding out what it is, and trust that God knows, as always, what he's doing.

Your prayers for me at this time would be greatly appreciated, and I'd love to respond in kind. I remember to pray far less often that I should, so having names would be a wonderful thing. If you'd like me to pray for you/exchange prayers, leave your name as a comment, or tweet/DM me @corybantically, or if you have me on facebook, private message me!

Thanks for putting up with my ramblings about the interior working about the Christian church. Leave any questions in the comments and I'll try and explain more clearly :) 

God bless!

J.R. x 

A Simple Faith

My shower is evidently a very inspiring place to be. I seem to think up most of my blog posts in it.

(Yes, you needed that contextual information.)

As usual, this morning, I was thinking about my frustration at A-Level R.E. It's a great subject, but it doesn't relate to my faith at all, and so I struggle with the dull critical essays which bandy around words like 'soteriology' 'replacement theology' 'eschatology' e.t.c. without ever getting to the heart of the matter. I sincerely doubt that heaven will only be open to those who can describe using key words and quotations the development of the covenant relationship between God and Man. I don't mean that we should be ignorant and never question faith, not at all; I just doubt that many people will discover their faith on page 235587395158a of Religion for Dummies. 

So I've decided to tell the story of faith in my own words here, as I'd tell it to a child or a bible scholar. I can't guarantee its theological accuracy or even state that it fits in with any particular denomination. Since I took my faith on for myself around thirteen, I've been working on this, asking God questions and trying to make sense of it all, something I'm going to be doing all my life. So this story isn't perfect, isn't complete. Please be patient. 

(When I write 'God thought' e.t.c. this is artistic liberty. I'm not trying to put words into God's mouth.)

This story has no beginning. Recently, I heard a quote from a famous writer on short stories, suggesting that when the story is finished, the start and end should be cut off. I, however, do not know how this story starts or finishes. I am not the author. I am a minor character on page 98, but I'm quite content with my little part. 

For all intents in purposes, it starts with God. No-one except God knows how he got there, or why. Some people argue that this is an unsatisfactory start and that God ought to justify being there if we're meant to believe in him, but as yet God has not answered this question. As I said, the story is far from finished. 

After demanding angrily from God what business he has in existing in the first place, and making things so awfully complicated by doing so, the next question is 'What is God anyway?' Generally, humans like to greet each other by demanding 'Who are you?' but no-one seems to have thought of asking God this yet. They've been trying tests and writing papers on the question for years, but just asking the question never satisfies human curiosity. Humans like to poke and prod and ask questions. Again, this is not a bad thing. 

The one thing that one particular group of people have become certain of about God is that he is Love. Love, like God, is notoriously difficult to define and at some point in their lives every human attempts to do so. My own favourite definition was for some years 'God's favourite drug', a sentence that I felt embodied a suitable amount of sarcasm, naivety and fashionable faith lingo. For now, I've given up pretending to know anything about love. We all know enough, anyhow. You don't need me to tell you about it. 

The scene is thus set for the opening of the story. God is love, or at least he is very good at loving, or something like that, is existing. Nothing else does. There is silence. Peace. 

But all creatures who love need others to love them back. Contrary to human preoccupation, this whole faith-thing didn't start because we needed God. It started because God needed us. 

So God made all of Creation, and it was beautiful. Everything was good, and everything that was good came from God, and was of God. The animals loved him blindly and were part of him in their love. 

The problem was that love does not come from obedient, unswerving devotion. Real love is a choice, and God knew this, as he chose to love his creation, but they did not choose to love him. It was the love of master and servant. It was beautiful, but it was not enough. 

So God started again. He had a brilliant, radical idea. He would make people, built on his own image, with the same capacity to choose to love. He knew, with a heavy heart, that they might reject him and do terrible things to each other in their capacity for hatred, but he did it anyway. Love was worth paying the price for. 

So humanity came about, and they were beautiful. God loved them immensely, and was desperate for them to love him back. Yet as he had feared, they began to turn against him. Temptation lead them into ignorance, and even evil. Some did love him, but a good many simply forgot about him in their rush to discover the new world, and so the relationship with God was lost to humans. 

God stayed with them. He watched them develop and evolve, guiding them, walking amongst them unseen. Some glimpsed him and as the people split over continents and seas, different understandings of God appeared. Some saw his left side, some saw his right, but no-one ever saw him in his fullness. God hid himself in the good things of the world to shield their eyes, and hoped that one day, they would find him.

Time passed.

Then God has an idea. He would tell someone about him and they and their descendants would be his helpers. They would tell others about him, be teachers of the human race. Eventually, he settled for a man named Abram and his wife Sarai. At this point, God could have appeared in glory, surrounded by angels and trumpets and loudly demonstrating his power, although the poor elderly couple probably would have had heart attacks. Instead, he decided to do the most marvellous thing for them, the thing they had been longing for all their lives. Sarai had never been able to have children, and she was too old. But nothing is impossible for God, and he gave her and Abram a son, Isaac. He also chose to rename them Abraham and Sarah. If I was writing an essay I'd call this a 'symbol of their new life', but I'm not, and I'd rather just call it one of the unfathomable quirks of God. 

Abraham and Sarah became the ancestors of the Israelites, God's chosen people - chosen to tell everyone about him and his tremendous love. But not even the Israelites could believe. So God sent them prophet after prophet. He rescued them from slavery, sent them brave leaders to keep them safe, and guided them to a place where they could live in peace. However, the Israelites were just humans like us, so they disobeyed God, and frequently failed to understand him. They fought with their neighbours and kept the truth about God to themselves, so no-one else really came to faith. Who can blame them? The Christian Church has often done the same thing. It's a very human crime. 

God watched all of this and he was sad. He saw them go further away from him and make each other suffer, and it hurt him. He'd tried everything. 


Then, God had a brilliant idea. 


This is the complicated part, because now we get to the idea of 'Trinity', or, three in one. Frankly, no-one, not St Thomas Aquinas or Simon Peter or the Archbishop of Canterbury really understands how this works. God is just too big for human minds. To be limited is to be free to make mistakes, to be ourselves, to make choices and be amazed by the wonders of creation, but it does make God hard to understand. So God needed to meet humanity in a way we would understand, and to do this, he sent part of himself to earth. To demonstrate his love, he set this up as a Father/Son relationship, but in reality they're the same, two different ways of seeing God. To cap it all, God then threw in the Holy Spirit, because he knew we'd find it tough, believing in him, and he wanted to show us a way to reach him, without expecting celestial telephones to drop down whenever we want a chat. The best way I can describe it is like an iceberg. They say that only 20% of an iceberg is visible above the surface - that's the 'Son' part - and 80% is underneath, and that's the 'Father' part. Then I guess all the frozen water nearby is the Holy Spirit... perhaps I'll let that analogy drop. 


Anyway, God sends his son to earth. As humans have proved we're not very good at recognising God, God made his son a human, born in a provincial backwater of the Roman Empire amongst the Israelites and named a rather common Hebrew name, Jesus. 


Here I could write books and books. (Although I don't need to: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John have done it for me). Telling this story 2000 years later, about a man I never met in the flesh, I am almost overwhelmed by my feelings for him. Creation was brilliant, but Jesus was a master-stroke. Many humans came to respect him, even those who disbelieved his teaching, for his morality, his kindness, his love. In the three years he spent teaching, he gathered around him a small group of followers who would go on to spread his message throughout the world. But Jesus wasn't just around to spread the word. He had something else in mind, harder and more complicated to explain than anything God had ever done before. 


When asked why Jesus had to die, many Christians have come up against a massive wall. 
"We're sinners," They reply, "We have to be saved." 
"Are we sinners?" responds the atheist. "Why? And why do I owe this God anything? Personally, I think I'm quite a good person. This Jesus didn't have to die for me." 


I cannot even pretend to have a decent or full answer to this. Like I said, I'm writing a unfinished story. 


I suppose the nearest thing I have to an answer to this is that choosing God, choosing to love him means giving up everything that is not of God, all the evil thoughts, temptations, un-Godly ways of living. Humans never manages this. Through the grace of God, some of us can get pretty near - think Mother Teresa - but in the end we just can't give up our evil enough to get close to God. Life comes from God and is of God; without God, we die, far apart from him. It's the worst punishment ever. Humans have tried to imagine Hell as a representation of our worst fears, all flames and whips and chains, but the truth is Hell is worse than this. If all that is good is of God, than to reject God, or turn away from him because of our dependence on sin, means that in the next life when we should be with him and all that is good we must go where God is not, and all that is of God is absent. This is an evil of our own making, and it makes God so very, very sad. 


So God decided to break the rules.


Okay, he thought, they can't break away from sin and all that, so they're stuck with the consequences. But what if I took the consequences away? Jesus could do that. 


Although, they won't be grateful .


But I love them. I'll do it anyway. I miss them so much, and I want them home. 


So God gave Jesus a task. He, God himself, had to die, and descend into the place of unbelief, breaking its power. Then all the people would have to do is follow him out, and forget all the consequences. Jesus was a man and he was scared, but he was also a God who loved humanity, so he obeyed. And God the Father did give him the choice. Jesus chose to love, and chose to die one of the most terrible deaths ever invented. Crucifixion was an excruciatingly painful, drawn-out, public way to die, offensive to the religious beliefs of the Israelites and designed to humiliate the victim. Uncomplaining, he went to his death.


But God wasn't finished yet. 


On the third day, something happened. In the tomb where Jesus' body lay, God stirred. The son came back to life. Time was ripped open; those who had died, those who were dying, those who hadn't even gotten around to being born yet - everyone was saved, and could choose to live again with God, should they accept it. All they had to do was trust God and accept his love, and they could be forgiven anything, could escape the consequences of their prior actions, could be renewed. It was brilliant. 


Of course, nothing is so simple as just accepting love. 


"Why did you make us suffer? Was it you? You weren't there. What about the cancer? The floods? The wars? Did you do that? Why didn't you help us?"


So the questions started, and the people began to vivisect God. It got complicated, very quickly, and even the best storytellers had no proper answers.


Yet God was always there, in the confusion. He walked through hospitals, holding hands, guiding the surgeons, opening the eyes of the children, weeping with the bereaved. He sat with the soldiers, in the pubs, in the back-rows of the lecture theatres, crying for our losses and celebrating our joys. Some people said that it was a test, others that the only way to see God is also to see evil. Some spoke of a devil, the embodiment of evil, or a battle between good and evil in the world. Evil existed, they were sure, but often they forgot about all the good that existed too.


God did not give his reasons. He was proved and did-proved, loved and hated, lost and found. He waited. All the time, he still loved. 






Writing this I'm so conscious of how much I owe God, more than I could ever repay. The beauty is, I don't need to repay him. Just accept his love. My love for him is imperfect, small, flawed, but I know I am loved and one day I hope that I will be able to love him perfectly back.


God Bless & peace out x 
J x