TBTG

Aaah, what an awesome day.
I just spent a great four hours with a good good friend. Thank you Will! And thanks be to God.

I have been desperate to talk with someone about belief for a while and it just never quite happened. I could never bring it up. I've been apathetic for a long while now, and alternately anxious and comfortable with that. But tonight talking with Will was like a poke in the eye (a gentle, friendly poke if you will). I realize that I have been searching for 'the right' kind of inspiration, 'the right' kind of book or article or song or whatever to help me - I've been waiting for something to move me, but skeptical of any time I felt moved. Tonight I feel the beginning of the realization that if I choose to pursue God, to actively engage in my relationship with the divine, the pattern-that-moves-in-all-things, then God will use anything to meet me.

Recently I have felt keenly a need to be connected to the church. To be connected not just to people, but also to people who live as though God is real. Because God is real. And that's not something I've come to know because of going to church on Sundays or youth group or whatever. God is real in my life because God has always been real in my life, as long as I can remember. I doubt it all the time to be sure. I struggle with the details, with the "Christian-ese," the often cliche imagery that I don't understand anymore. I struggle with the idea that God is a person, or a male person for that matter, or that God could possibly care what I want, or that God would ordain genocide (the Old Testament?) - there are plenty of intellectual issues to have with religion, and I'm not yet sure what to do with those. And there's a lot of shit that people have done in the name of religion, that's true. But what happens to me when I love a person just for being a person is very real, and I honestly don't think I can do that on my own. That's the Lord. And damn, that is powerful, that is mind-boggling to me, that is freeing.

Anyway. It's been a good day. I drove straight to church from Fort Collins, and missed everything except for the Holy Eucharist. So it was not my usual church experience, but that's a good thing - 'usual' means I'm probably not listening so much.

Ramble ramble ramble...to bed now. To be continued...