rainy day prayer

I write my prayers; I have trouble articulating them otherwise. I don’t share them. This one, though, I wanted to share. It summarizes what I’ve been feeling spiritually for quite a few years now.

———

I’m at the point where I don’t know if I would recognize Your voice if I heard it. No, that’s not true. Your voice is this quiet, in this room, as cars go by in the rain like steady white noise, like waves. What does the voice say?

Peace, peace.

I can feel myself become calm. My heartbeat slows.

I guess I’m just not sure if that’s “good enough.” Most of my conversations about You now are like seeping wounds, barely just scabbing over. I feel like all I have to tell people is how the church let me down, how Christians let me down, how the different denominations (Lutheran, Episcopal, Evangelical, charismatic) let me down. I don’t really have a silver lining. Is that because something is wrong with me?

I guess the one good thing from all that I can tell someone everything You are not. You’re not loneliness in a crowd of girls at a Christian retreat, or an angry argument over Facebook, or the agonizing fear of demons in every corner. You’re not silence from friends after a church collapsed. You’re not shame. Rage. Hate.

But…what are You, then? Am I starting from scratch? I feel like my insides are scraped clean, ready to be filled with…what?

Easter season is about rebirth, right? I guess that’s what I ready for.

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We Are The Reason

To everyone who says, “I’m praying for you,” but never picks up the phone or sends an e-mail to check in:

      We are making our prayers meaningless.

To the young Christians who post hateful content on Facebook and spread gossip about their peers:

     We are the modern world’s Pharisees.

To the believers who use politics and theology to cause strife and create division:

      We are destroying the Church.

To the pastors and priests who abuse their authority:

       We are shaming the name of Jesus.

To the Christian in Pennsylvania who stoned a 70-year old gay man to death:

       We do not follow a God of love.

To the members of Westboro Church, who picket the funerals of children and soldiers:

      We are not doing God’s work.

To every Christian who confesses with their mouth that they follow Jesus, but then deny Him by their actions:

      We are the reason people can still believe there is no God.