Losing ground
“How can I explain personal pain?”
—Violent Femmes, “Gimme the Car”
My faith in God has never been Herculean, in fact has only resembled a broken, frail little man on its best day. I’m not sure if I pulled the plug or if natural causes took their final payment, but I recently realized I’ve been living with a corpse.
I hear people talk about “freedom in Christ,” but I’ve only ever known the bonds of guilt and inadequacy, rusty shackles that dig into my wrists and ankles. There’s talk of security in the life to come, but I’m more familiar the insecurities that plague me here and now—crippling anxiety and a breath-robbing fear of the unknown. I’m surrounded by those devoted to a “loving God,” but I’ve known him to be cruel and indifferent too many times…one too many times.
I’ve been castigated and discarded by Christian institutions that have decreed me, by way of my inescapable doubt, to be prideful, worldly, and sinful. I’ve run to the darkest corners of my faith trying to hide from these chastising voices, but they persist and the moments when I could effectively hide from them have been few and far between. Most days haven’t come to a close without some self-inflicted soul-flagellation. I’m bitter as hell against these people, I’ll be the first to admit that, but they’re just people…their wounds were blunt and the punctures have festered for decades without healing, but they weren’t mortal. Those fuckers aren’t faith killers.
But the thing is, sitting here, I just don’t see God anymore. Not the way I used to or, to be honest, never really did but so badly wanted to. What happened to Delia doesn’t fit with Christian faith at all…she was innocent, she was untouched by any kind of blemish the world could inflict upon her. If there is a God, this was his doing, and this “personal relationship” I have so long claimed to have with him can only be viewed as abusive.
I don’t know what I believe. I’m okay with that. Maybe God once intervened but we’ve screwed things up so much that he’s turned his back on us. Or maybe we’ve invented him as an intangible excuse for the atrocities that mankind persists in inflicting upon the least powerful amongst us.
I prefer to think of God as the titular character in The Flaming Lips’ song, “Waitin’ for a Superman”: He wants to help, and it hurts him that he can’t, but it’s already so heavy, so very heavy….
