an attempt to get real about my spirituality, part one

This is the first of what I propose to be a lengthy missive concerning my spirituality...

I'm writing this whatever-it-is in an attempt to be honest about the spirituality I've embraced throughout the course of my life. I've vacillated back and forth from one set of teachings to another, most of which claim to be "the only way". I've blamed this on my bipolar disorder, and I do think that is a very large factor in the way I become so obsessed with one or the other. Then I have justified my lack of commitment by claiming to more or less extract useful "wisdom" from whatever tradition I happen to be caught up it in an attempt to put it all together. I hoped that the sum total of all the parts would give me a way to live in a unique way. And yes, I still kind of think that's what I mostly do. I just don't know how much of it sticks or whether my ability to discern what is actually "wisdom" from crap that just sounds good to me.

I was not brought up in a religious home. I remember going to church a few times as a very young child. I think it was because my grandfather was a deacon or maybe even a pastor of a church (freewill baptist, if I recall correctly...which I may not). I remember playing "ring around the rosies" with my cousins and brothers in the front yard or wherever by the church. But most of all I hold dear the memory of singing "In the Garden" on the 'stage' with the other kids from the Sunday school classes. Who knows but that I discovered my love for performing in front of an audience while singing that song for the congregation. To this day it's one of my favorite hymns.

Those church visits were few and far between, if memory serves. The time between my young childhood and early adolescence was spent without any acknowledged religion at all. I say "acknowledged", what I mean is that my mother and father never talked about it. Not in front of us and, knowing them, not by themselves. It was understood that they believed in God. They both came from families that were very rooted in religion. Aunts on my mother's side were involved with the Holiness church...crazy church. I'm glad they didn't drag me along to that nonsense. As for dad's family, I never did know that. But grandmother Casey, who alternately lived with her many children, always carried a bible with her and read it daily. She was the most saintly person I ever knew. Granted a child typically sees nothing but the good in a grandparent, but I can't for the life me think of anything about her that would offend anyone. On the contrary, she seemed to embody the Christian teaching of love they neighbor as you love yourself. But what do I know, right?

I didn't think twice about it until a friend of mine started talking to me about going to Falls Creek Baptist camp with him. He didn't have any proseltysing motive for wanting me to come...it was just a fun place. Sure you had to listen to three really long sermons a day, but on the other hand there were a lot of really hot girls he would be there and the "streets" were packed with them after the evening service. You had a couple of hours to prowl around and leer before you had to return to your cabin.

Anyway you kind of had to be involved with the Baptist church to go there. I'm not sure if that's correct, but you do have to be sponsored by someone if you can't pay your own way (which I couldn't...hell, I didn't even know this was the case until much, much later). Whatever, I decided to sing in the youth choir with my friend. Nothing special about that. Certainly didn't make me want to convert.

Camp was fun, as expected. I didn't mind all the sermons...in fact, I kind of enjoyed them. Don't ask me why. I still have a soft spot for a good sermon. But the deal with all that was how they would extend an invitation to "accept Christ" towards the end of every evening service. By the second night you'd already start to have people coming to the front "becoming Christians". It was like the domino effect because every night afterwards there would be more and more people coming to the front. Which gave me the distinct impression that a good chunk of them (most of them?) weren't finding the Lord all of a sudden. They were going up there because it was "the thing to do". Maybe I was cynical but I figured that's why so many of them sort of abandoned the "Christian life" or gave up trying to "act like a Christian" as they had done so effortlessly during the first several days of their "life with Christ".

I went up front eventually...I think it was on the Friday before we were to go home. Might have been Thursday, I don't know. I've always been haunted by WHY I might have done it. I don't think I was one of the people who were just going with the flow...but that might just be selective memory because I don't want to think that it was or could be the reason. I really did feel compelled. I wasn't thinking of one reason, or that I needed forgiveness for any one particular thing. Was it that I wanted to? Or that I felt like I needed to? I don't think it's the latter...it was more like I HAD to. I don't know if I can explain that. Not that I "had" to because I needed to make a commitment. Like I said, I simply felt compelled to walk to the aisle and down to the pulpit.

Maybe the fact that I BELIEVE this was how it went down makes it the same as if it had been that way...so if such is the case, yes, I believe that I was "saved" by Jesus Christ and that the Holy Spirit lives in me and that my life must be dedicated to serving God to the best of my abilities. I've looked at this as "my anchor". Sometimes I've gone so far out on a limb that I've practically denied those things, that I've considered myself an atheist altogether, or maybe I've just become so absorbed in another "religion" or philosophy that I lost sight of it. It's my bipolar, I'm sure, because I always come back to "the anchor". I feel like a hypocrite and a compulsive apostate sometimes. I'll come back to Jesus, get back into the bible, all the while knowing that sooner or later I'll stray again. So why bother, right? I feel like I've abandoned something or someone that is very real to me...

But wait...maybe it hasn't seemed real to me? I've wanted it to be real.

Anyway, I attended the Baptist church for awhile after that. Usually just sitting in the back pews with the other teenagers but I always thought I got more out of the sermons than most of them did. This isn't being boastful. It's just that it was obvious the other kids weren't all into it like I was. Only one other person, Mark White, was into it deeper than me.

At some point I met my fiance-to-be, Barbara, and started attending the Methodist church, where she was a member. It wasn't just that I wanted to be where she was, though I did. The Baptist pastor, a man named Roy Brown who I liked very much, had a nervous breakdown right in front of the congregation during a Sunday evening service. I was never sure as to the reasons why but alway presumed they had something to do with deacons and elders and whatever it is that those sorts get involved in.Whatever it was, Brother Brown wound up leaving and was replaced by a huge & boisterous man named Scotty Newton. He was the dictionary definition of conservative right wing preacher...I don't even know if those terms were used way back then but that's what he was. I much preferred the laid back style of the Methodist minister, Larry Jacobson. Larry was one of the most Godly people I have ever known.

Somehow I wound up going to Falls Creek again, but this time it was with Barbara in tow so I remember absolutely nothing more than our puppy love hand holding yadda yadda yadda. We went to Methodist camp, too, sometime around then. I wasn't real crazy about it. It was a lot "livelier" than Falls Creek and that kind of stuff never appealed to me.

So from then until Barbara and I got married and on until she left me I was a devout Methodist. I listened to a lot of Christian rock music..did I already talk about that? Well I did. And I read Cornerstone as often as I could get my hands on a copy. A big fan of Keith Green's I kept up with his ministry via the Last Days Newsletter. At one point we even gave serious consideration to moving to Texas and becoming part of the ministry. I thought I was pretty solid as a Christian but there was always one sticking point with me and that was my lack of faith in prayer. I didn't feel like God was listening and I certainly didn't think it would do any good to ask for anything. I always felt guilty for this.

One evening we were at the mall, browsing in the bookstore, and I found a copy of a book by Elizabeth Claire Prophet. It was in the Metaphysical section, which would now be called the New Age section. I'd read just a little bit about new age some time before and thought it was interesting. I bought the book, but only on the strength of how unusual it was and, believe it or not, the cover art. I'm sure I never read it in it's entirety, and maybe not even past the first chapter. But from that point on I knew I wanted to be associated in some way or another with the new age movement.

In the meantime Barbara and I were going to concerts by contemporary Christian artists every couple of weeks. We saw some real legends: Larry Norman, Randy Stonehill... Those were a lot of fun. I actually "stole"/"borrowed" lots of books from the Methodist church library. Lots of deep stuff. Scholarly and all. I'd put them on my bookshelf though I never read any of them. It's not that I wanted people to think I was a great Christian or anything. I just wanted to feel like I was more of a Christian than I probably was, if that makes sense (and it probably doesn't). All of this just to say that I definitely viewed myself as a Christian during those years. I was more interested in bible commentary than the bible itself but whatever. At least I knew there was something wrong with that.