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The Cost Of Finding God

June 11, 2010 in religion, Sad

I had a close friend in college who was an absolute blast.  She was the type of person who’d go with you anywhere, to do anything, no matter how mundane, and she’d make it fun.  She was loud, she sang constantly (and extremely well), and she was so passionate about life.  You couldn’t help but love her and want to be around her.  I don’t think I can accurately describe what an incredibly fun, warm and caring person she is.  I can still hear her laughter whenever I see a picture of her.

We lived in the same dorm for 3 years, and became close friends over that time.  But somewhere between sophomore and junior year, she found God.

I hate that term—“found God”—but it’s really the best way to put it in this case.  All of a sudden, she came back to school and she always had her Bible with her, and talked constantly about praying for God to provide what she needed, or help her grow, or something.  She read her Bible so much that her schoolwork started to suffer.  Which, I guess in the grand scheme of things for her was not a big deal, but it always bothered me anyway.  It’s really none of my business, I guess.

She was still vibrant and fun and warm and caring, but there was something different about her.  She was apart from the rest of us in some fundamental but invisible way.  She tried her hardest to get me involved in church- and campus ministry-related things she was doing, but I just never felt connected.  And as she grew into her faith, our friendship grew apart.

I ask myself all the time why this happened.  Does she make me uncomfortable?  Do I feel that she’s judging me?  Honestly, no.  I’ve genuinely felt that she only wants me to be a part of her faith because it makes her so incredibly happy, and she just wants that for me.  I go to church sometimes, but I feel like I don’t belong.  I’ve found fulfillment in other ways, for better or worse.

I guess I don’t understand her anymore.  The person I knew is someone entirely different now.  Her religion or faith or whatever you want to call it is not the sum total of her person, but it’s literally all she talks about, ever.  I still read her blog sometimes, and every post is about the ways in which she’s growing in her faith, how God provided for her or challenged her today, and a whole host of things to which I simply can’t relate.  Part of me wishes I could; I’m not sure if it’s because I think I should be able to relate, or if it’s just because I miss my friend.

Today I saw a post on her blog that started out, “Interesting fact: Local health departments don’t treat virgins.”  What does that even mean?  What the hell is she talking about?  Who the hell is this person, and what did she do with my friend?

Today my grandfather called me to congratulate me on landing a job, and he said, “Is there a chapel on campus?”  I told him I didn’t know, but that there is a Cathedral near my house.  “Tomorrow, go into the church and just stay for 5 minutes and say thanks to God.  This is all because of him.”  I want to believe that.  In some ways, I do, especially since this job just landed in my lap.  But I’ll never believe it to the degree my friend does, and I’m afraid that’s always going to keep us apart.

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  • http://wordsmoker.com breakingblues

    I went to college with a lot of people who were finding God or Jesus, even if they didn’t do it so quickly. I even hung out with the Baptists for a spell my sophomore or junior year, partly because I wanted a group to hang out with, partly because I wanted to get in one of the group’s pants. I found out Baptist Guy was a jerk, and that ended that.

    I did get into a few heated debates about abortion or feminism or something with a few of the people. That was fun, sort of. I went to church maybe twice, because I felt like I should because they kept inviting me.

    Church groups ruled the campus, and it was a quick way to get friends, so I see why some people fell for it. I think the social component is a big reason for church membership, quite frankly. But a lot of them were self-righteous dishonest pricks. Coming up to me in the library and asking me to take a “survey” that quickly turned religious, like “If you died today, how sure are you that you would go to heaven?” My answer wasn’t quite “Fuck you,” but it shoulda been.

    Anyway, I feel you on religion keeping people apart. My mom is a lot more religious than I am, and she understands to a point why I’m not, but I think it also makes her a little sad, maybe?

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/dahlelama/ DahlELama

    Alas–I know this situation well. In fact, we in the MOJ (Modern Orthodox Jew) world have a different phrase for it: Flipping out. (Seriously, there’s even a song about it–if I can track it down, I’ll post it below.) It most often happens during that year between high school and college when a very large portion of MOJs go to yeshiva/seminary in Israel for a year or two. It’s a crazy thing, to suddenly not be able to recognize someone you used to know, and it’s amazing the extremes to which people can go. It’s often the people who were the biggest sluts and druggies in high school who end up “finding God” and flipping out. Suddenly, that guy who groped you on an airplane won’t so much as shake your hand. (Uh, hypothetically speaking.) I empathize with your frustration, and good for you for being true to yourself.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/mama-penguino-2-2-2/ Mama Penguino

    Kate, can you get God to talk to my boss about a raise, please?

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/marshmueller/ marshmueller

    Oh, no. She got “Saved.” Have you seen that movie? It’s awesome. Mandy Moore throws a Bible! A ginormous statue of Jesus is erected and destroyed! Macaulay Culkin in a wheelchair!

    It’s one thing if a friend gets a new boyfriend and you see her less, or if a heavy courseload makes your visits frequent. But when someone “finds God,” their life agenda completely shifts. I’m sorry for your loss. I know it’s not really a loss, but in many ways it is.

    My first year of college was paid for (scholarship). It was at a private, religious-based university. I ended up dropping out after my first year. I thought the whole religion-based thing wouldn’t bother me, that it was subtle enough to enjoy my free ride of college. Not so much.

    Now, even though I hope the fucks at Sallie Mae burn the fuck down, I know that selling out wasn’t for me (at the time).

    -From a former drama geek who sold out to the business man so I could actually grow up and buy a house. Hey, must be the money!

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/nefariousnewt/ NefariousNewt

    She didn’t find “God,” she found “religion.” You don’t find God; God finds you.

    Those who find “religion” end up being more enthusiastic and passionate adherents to their chosen religion than those born into it, so the psychological studies show. This explains her need to couch everything in terms of her faith, and the complete and total abandon she fell into her religion with. There’s generally not much you can do, but watch them go. Their new faith blinds them to all their previous relationships and their value; they measure their past in terms of their new faith, and feel the need to “convert” those they know, so that you may know the joy and pleasure they feel in God.

    Nauseating, isn’t it?

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/pikadar/ PikaDar

    @Nefariousnewt: So true. @Dahl: flipping out happens later in life as well.

    @ katekate: Perhaps it’s the longevity that counts. I keep wanting to talk about my friend, but can I really call this person a friend anymore? Now this person is a contradiction. On one hand, this person is all religious. I want to put that in quotation marks, but who am i to judge? On the other hand, she’s simply the same person with limitations. Everything comes down to my not being spiritual enough. Ahem.

    And then there is the other “newly religious” person I know. What a drag. Always with the judge and jury. I can see it clearly. Like, I’m supposed to give up everything I’ve learned and renounce my whole life.

    Mind you, both of these people have agendas. I feel like the poster person for “See What Your Life Will Get You?” when around them.

    Icky. And sticky.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/pinekatz/ Pinekatz

    This topic starts crashing on the rocks when you have to navigate it with your kids. Its a lively philosophical argument that one has to reconcile with intelligent thought counterbalanced by faith.

    Now I feel so bad for my grandmother when back in the day I was 15 and started questioning everything after a dozen years of Sunday School and everything the Lutheran Church put into my confirmation. She was stoic about it all. She said it was a matter of faith and I’d see that someday. Maybe, probably.

    I really, really want to believe that we aren’t 100% managing our own affairs. Its easy to find nothing but a pile of shit here on the blue and green planet. But there are also so many purposeful good deeds everywhere and so much anger at injustice that I can’t help but wonder if maybe we are driven to do the Right Thing. Of course, the meaning of the Right Thing is at issue. There, you have religion ruining every-fucking-thing that isn’t running away from it.

    I have a great friend that use to be my try-new-restaurants/drinking buddy for 20 years. She married an ex-alcoholic. He is seeped in AA. I can hardly talk to her now. I get a God Talk. I just want to tell these two, please, don’t. I’m not a convert to anything, ever. I didn’t have to wreck cars and commit hideous acts to find Christianity. I was born there, 1000 years after some pagan converted.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/irishbreakfast/ irishbreakfast

    @NN: I think it’s Chuck Norris that finds you, actually.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/militantrubberducky/ MilitantRubberDucky

    Beautiful post, Kate.

    I used to be your friend – I went to church three times a week, sang in the choir, church camp in the summer, mission trips in the winter. I often sought solace in Scripture. I was on fire for God, and with good reason; feeling like you’re making a difference in someone’s life, in their joy, is a heady drink, and I drank deeply and often.

    But as good as I felt, I couldn’t get rid of the thoughts that didn’t jive with my good Christian upbringing. Why couldn’t I hang out with friends that weren’t ‘saved’? Why was I not allowed to have a boy in my room, even with the door open, while my brother had girls sleep over all the time? Why was I supposed to feel ashamed about my body, to never draw attention to it? Why didn’t I find anything wrong with the sex ed that was taught in public school, and why was it wrong for me to think that everyone should know about safe sex that went beyond abstinence? Why did I thank God that softball practice saved me from protesting abortion clinics?

    It took a while, and removing myself from that environment, to begin to get a grip on my sense of self. I don’t go to church anymore because of the hypocrisy, but sometimes I still miss that fellowship, the belonging to something bigger than yourself. I know that I believed so fervently because I had to; I couldn’t reconcile with the thought that we are ultimately here for nothing. I still have trouble thinking that we’re just molecules and energy interacting with other molecules and energy until we cease to be. Where does empathy fit in, if that’s the case? I doubt my feeling so much for others, when I cry at scenes of death and heartache and loss, is simply survival talking. Yes, I believe in God, but i don’t believe in the God of my childhood. Such a cruel and pompous God has no place in my life.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/katekate/ katekate is squared

    Thanks for reading, everybody. It’s continually nice/sad to share experiences here that resonate with people.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/shelwood/ shelwood

    I have a high school friend I recently reconnected with on facebook. He is a True Believer. If I mention that my serious chronic illness is acting up, I get a lengthy PM informing me that if I only accepted Jesus into my heart, I would be well. He also sent a nasty PM to another claassmate for being 45 and unmarried w/o children. He apparently had a net worth of $7m before the crash, now he has next to nothing. He doesn’t explain how Jesus allows this.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/katekate/ katekate is squared

    @Shelwood: If he’s anything like my friend, “God will provide.”

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/bjonston/ BJonston

    Religion is highly overrated. Loved this post, Kate. I’m sorry for your loss.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/hydroceph/ Hydroceph

    But Piney, that’s because you were the wrong kind of Lutheran. If you’d been ELCA (really, LCA at the time because they were the only true Lutherans), that never would’ve happened to you.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/hydroceph/ Hydroceph

    @Militant: Why couldn’t I hang out with friends that weren’t ’saved’? I had the same realization…while i was on a mission in Hong Kong.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/militantrubberducky/ MilitantRubberDucky

    @Hydro: Nice. Yeah, I lost a lot of good friends because I was pressured into not hanging out with them, even punished.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/perverseus/ perverseus

    @Dahl: You just took me back to high school. A friend of mine made the pilgrimage to Israel and came back very … different. Granted, more than 20 years later, she’s a rabbi and has a beautiful family (and during her recent visit down here in South Florida, I even asked her to toss a blessing at my daughter in Hebrew — couldn’t hurt, right?), so clearly it wasn’t just a phase. But the change in her was so very pronounced and disturbing at the time.

    @KateKate: Thanks for the post. Sadly, I must concur with the group: You have lost your friend. I personally find it very difficult to deal with people who push a religious agenda. The constant use of the Bible for an appropriate quote when a quip from “The Simpsons” works just as well. Using “God’s will” as a crutch or an excuse for just about anything. The hypocrisy of the Catholic church (I was raised Catholic but have not attended church regularly since 1993). All this stuff grates on me like sandpaper on sunburn.

    A quick example. I know someone who knows someone who was on trial a few years back. When the trial was looking positive (leaning toward not guilty), the sister of the accused sent e-mails updates talking about how God was on their side, praise God, etc. When the trial started turning ugly, God was still being praised in her e-mail updates, but He seemed to have lost his supply of magic super sugar smacks — but He still had a plan. Eventually, the trial ended. The brother was found guilty. He had sexually molested a high school student. Yet somehow this was all OK with God. Amazing.

  • http://wordsmoker.com/help/members-3/mama-penguino-2-2-2/ Mama Penguino

    This is why I like pantheism. Who the hell would ask a bunch of fireflies to help them win a trial?