Categories: faith
Date: 17 February 2010 12:59:09
Steve, you do ask difficult questions!
The short answer to “why religion at all?” is “I honestly have no idea.” I think I’ve always believed, sometimes it’s easier than other times, but I can’t think of a time when I believed that “this is all there is.” And I can’t say I always do this Christianity thing particularly well, but I keep trying [God: very trying. But I love you anyway].
Anyway, now for the long answer. I hope you’ve got the kettle on.
I was baptised into the Methodist church as a baby, with one godparent who was a Methodist, one who was Anglican, and one who was a lapsed Catholic. However, I wasn’t brought up in a specifically Christian home – we didn’t attend church apart from weddings and funerals, and when we went to see my grandparents in Cumbria.
On and off from when I was about 14 or 15, I attended a charismatic evangelical church that used to meet in my secondary school hall. To those who are reading this and know me at all, yes, really, charismatic evangelical house church, with weekday evening Bible studies and everything. To be honest, I am too English to do all that “hands down for coffee” stuff; I was always the one at the back with my hands in my pockets, looking faintly embarrassed. It has also left me with a life-long suspicion of “Words from the Lorrrrrrrrrrrd.” Even at fifteen, I could tell when I was being manipulated. I think it was there I got my phobia of the faceless people in the illustrated Good News Bible from, too.
So, drifting along, no huge, road to Damascus conversion experience, I went off to university in Manchester, and thought “I wonder if I should start taking this all a bit more seriously?”
Tried various churches, ran away from the charismatic ones, the one that told me that I needed to make a bit more of an effort with my clothes if I wanted to fit in (I was a student, what were you expecting, diamonds and fur?), and the bonkers one that wanted me to immediately move into their shared house.
And then I walked into Holy Name Church in Manchester, and, if it wasn’t for the fact that admitting you hear voices is generally the starting point of a one-way trip to the funny farm, I’d swear I heard a quiet voice saying “welcome home.”
Probably someone messing about in the shrine of the Holy Face, but there we are.
So I went back for Mass the next Sunday, and that was it. I had a sudden knowledge that this was right, that what the Catholics said about the Eucharist truly being the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ was, actually, true, despite how utterly ridiculous it sounds. And, having had that one, overwhelming glimpse of heaven, that sudden realisation that I had found Him Whom I sought with all my heart pouring through me like fire and ice, I’ve been tagging along behind as best I can ever since. Sure, there’s been stumbles along the way, but God’s grace is always there to pick me up and dust me off and clean the gravel out of my metaphorical knees.
This is all getting a bit heavy, isn’t it? I think my next post will have to be about cake.