HEADING FOR THE HEART - - Part 2

I was told that I screamed bloody murder when the minister of the Congregational Church held me up to the congregation once I had been baptized. I would later feel like screaming when I heard the stories of Jesus' crucifixion and the deaths of the early Christian martyrs. How could humans be so cruel and heartless?

I didn't understand the passages in the Old Testament of the Bible that talked about a vengeful God. That didn't seem to be like The Father to whom Jesus referred. Yet, later in life, that was the kind of God that was portrayed by some who professed to be Christian; these same Christians who would persecute me because I was gay.

So much of what I learned through religion seemed to contradict the messages of love and forgiveness that Jesus brought to us. I felt both shame along with anger and indignation. That eventually led me to leave the church. That would not happen until I was in my early twenties.

As a child, I regularly attended church and Sunday school where I soaked up the affirmation that Jesus loved me. By the time I became a teen, I looked forward to joining my church and participating in communion. The church that I attended by then was a Presbyterian Church. As much as I found comfort in my faith, the practices and sermons I heard in that church did not stir my spirit. I had no concept that what I wanted was a more expressive as well as a more personal form of spirituality that would eventually include mysticism - a personal experience of the Holy Spirit working within me.

I became active in the Youth Fellowship where I served as president. I sang in the youth choir and I wrote prayers and sermons which I delivered on Youth Sunday and at youth retreats. Little did I realize that what came through me when I wrote was my own innate spiritual understanding. I was a tiny flower whose petals had only started to glimpse the sunlight.

It would take me many years before I realized that I was indeed blossoming. In the interim, there would be much hardship and a feeling that God had forsaken me in between those times. Yet, even as I would walk in paths of darkness that led me to utter despair, I never lost hope or I wouldn't be here today.

I can now see how everything in my life and in the totality of life happens for a reason. Although much of it makes no sense, that's just the mystery of this life which has nothing to do with the heaven which I have come to learn resides within myself. I came to believe that the only true hell is that which we create within ourselves stemming from when we judge ourselves or others in unloving ways. We are all children of God and therefore we are unconditionally loved. All is forgiven because God only wants what is best for His children; so I believe!

Author Davis Aujourd'hui