Angry Conversations with God (27 page)

All my life I had felt God’s presence: the Jesus in the yard; the God in the clouds of a March sky; the God who spoke to me
in dreams; the still, small voice I heard when I sat and prayed for hours. Even when I’d pushed him away he remained the Still,
Small Squatter I could not evict. Now I could hear nothing, feel nothing, know nothing. The squatter had vacated. So what
began as a collapse of romance and career turned into something far more sinister: a collapse of belief. Church was not safe.
Maybe God wasn’t either.

Susan: I know I’ve chosen some bizarro churches, Rudy. But those last ones—Othropraxy Dude, Organic and Raw, and the yuppies—they’re
mainline denominations, not gold-teeth hippies in circus tents. But even if the problem is all mine, I just can’t endure one
more forty-five-minute worship set followed by one more three-point sermon on “How to Be Better.” I don’t want to be better.
I want Jesus! Is it me? Have I lost it?!

Rudy: It’s not just you, Susan. The American church is messed up. Of course, there are millions of loving Christians with
real, honest faith. But the American church on the whole has become more concerned with the American dream than with Christ’s
dream for us. We’ve been selling programs and products aimed at self-improvement and personal fulfillment. Yes, Jesus came
to give us abundant life. But he didn’t come to sell
stuff.
The church sold you
stuff,
Susan. You got robbed.

Susan: I knew it. I knew something was wrong. What a horrible relief.

Rudy: What does that mean?

Susan: I’m relieved it’s not just me. It’s horrible because it’s true.

Rudy: I’m not saying it’s all the church’s fault, but it’s not all yours either.

So Rudy wasn’t coming with a magic mirror I could look into and see my life right side up. The truth was far more difficult.
What if God’s will was simply: “Love me and do what you like”? Or “Lay down your life and die,” or “Lay down your life and
live”
? Forget it. It was useless to ask. The years were gone. They were never coming back.

The only safe place outside of Rudy’s office was my writing class, so I wrote. I was predisposed to love my teacher, Terrie;
she was a Beatles fanatic like I was. But Terrie was also a fantastic teacher. She emboldened the shyest writer; she could
listen to the same boring story every week and coax out something beautiful and original every time. And when all I could
do was cry, she encouraged me to keep writing.

It was one thing to cry to Terrie after class, but quite another to read my writing in front of other students. Most of them
were too cool, too secular, too intellectual. Like Andrea Askowitz, a secular Jewish lesbian who was writing a bitingly funny
memoir about having a baby on her own; or Cameron, who was born in Tonga, kidnapped by Mormons, and taken to Salt Lake City.
Their stories were so hip and interesting and original. I was sure they were annoyed by my endless talk about God. I could
hear Pastor Ingebretsen: “The world will persecute you because you love Jesus.”

“I don’t want to read.” I cringed in front of them. “I’m tired of my God story.”

“I’m not!” Andrea perked up.

“It’s just another piece about my white-girl Christian drama. I can’t read it!”

“Then just talk about it,” Terrie suggested, “and we’ll ask you questions.”

Ugh, maybe this would be worse. No, it would be worse not to talk. So I talked.

“Okay, isn’t the spiritual life supposed to be a hike up the mountain? You know—people hike up the mountain to find the Buddha?
Well, it’s a hike, all right. And mine is a schlep up Mount Everest. I always thought the church was the path upward. My ex,
Jack, didn’t want to go up that trail. He wanted to go back down to base camp and suck oxygen in a tent. Weasel. Well, I did
not get this far up Mount Everest to turn back. So Jack and I broke up and he hiked down. But the minute—
the minute!
—I start back up the trail, I walk into church with its hair gel and Abercrombie and narcissist pastors! It’s totally FUBAR!
There’s no trail upward; it’s just a bunch of self-improvement loops around the same stretch of nowhere! And I can’t go back
down to Jack because he’s at base camp French-kissing some Sherpa at the pretzel cart!”

“Do you want Jack back?” Terrie asked.

“No, no. Forget I mentioned Jack. It’s not about Jack.
It’s about the mountain.
I can’t go back down. And I have no way up. So why am I here? Did God lead me up the mountain to die?”

“What are you going to do, Susan?” Terrie asked.

“I’ve got to keep climbing. Even if I have to climb over rocks, even if I fall into a crevasse and die, I have no other choice.
I have to find out if God is up there.”

“Do you think he is?”

“When I was eight I felt Jesus stand next to me. He can show up on a mountain!”

“I’m completely secular,” Terrie went on. “I have no language for that. You have to tell me what that felt like and looked
like.”

“What do you want me to say—that my hair stood on end and the wind stopped? I just knew.”

“I was raised Mormon,” Cameron interjected. “I know exactly what you’re talking about, having Jesus stand next to you.”

An awkward silence followed. They all probably thought I was a geek.

Geoff, a nihilist punk rocker, spoke up. “I feel like I’m at base camp watching you climb Everest. I could never do it. But
it’s pretty cool watching you do it.”

I didn’t leave class that day with answers. But there was something in just being listened to without someone giving “the
Answer.” Maybe God and art had something in common. Maybe my writer friends were closer to spiritual friends than anyone else
was right now. And none of them said, “Where we are going is Jesus.”

Rudy: I think you’re going through your Dark Night of the Soul.

Susan: Yes, I know the term. And it sure feels dark. But tell me what that really means.

Rudy: It’s a purging of the senses and the spirit. Remember when you first walked with God? He led you with big strokes; he
gave you big doses of his presence. In the dark night, he removes the signs, the blessings, and the sense of his presence.
He disappears from your senses and your spirit to the point that it feels like he doesn’t exist.

Susan: But why? Is it a test?

Rudy: God wants to destroy anything in your faith that’s based on you: your senses or your intellect or even your heart. Because
you
will fail you. But ultimately that’s a blessing. Not many people make it that far.

Susan: I’m not in the advanced class. I have screwed up too much to be that far along.

Rudy: Well, maybe God’s trying to get you to catch up.

Susan: Have you ever had a dark night?

Rudy: Yes. It’s called “seminary.”

I got a letter from my sister. We hadn’t talked since she hissed at me about wanting to marry a man who was going to hell.
She apologized in her letter, but she was also hurt that I’d called her a James Dobson mix tape. “James Dobson has done a
lot for our family. I just want my kids to enjoy being kids while they’re kids.”

I called her and apologized for my remark. But I told her I was never going to be a Focus on the Family fan. I didn’t have
a family to focus on. I found family with the artists and the outcasts of the world. “They need to see a different Jesus than
the one James Dobson offers.”

“I feel like you’re judging me, Susan.”

“I’m not. I’m proud of your kids. You’re doing a great job. I always felt like you were judging
me
! Maybe we’re just called to different kinds of families, that’s all.”

Nancy changed the subject. “So how are you doing?” I used to hate when she asked me that. I felt like she was trying to trap
me into a confession. But her voice was devoid of judgment. She was just asking.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do anymore, Nancy.”

“Have you thought of doing acting as a hobby?”

“Have you thought of being a mom as a hobby? I’ve wanted to act and write my entire adult life.”

“I’m sorry, Susan. I just meant maybe you could find another way to do it.”

“Maybe. But first I have to get out of this spiritual desert.”

“That’s not necessarily a bad place to be, Susan. When you have nothing but God, you know he’s the only one you can truly
turn to.”

Sophie called. A friend e-mailed her a job ad from a church. “The ad says, ‘Good pay, flexible hours.’ Since you’re broke
and desperate, you might want to check it out.” Okay, so she didn’t say desperate, but I
was.
And the irony of working at a church just when church felt unsafe was far too intriguing. Sophie forwarded me the e-mail.
It was the Orthopraxy, Dude church.

Pastor Bloviator greeted me at the door. His name was Frank. Up close, he wasn’t such a bloviator. He was actually pretty
nice. He sat me down. “Tell me about yourself!” He waited, smiling kindly.

I opened my mouth and burst into tears. I dumped everything on him, from the career death to Central Park to how church didn’t
feel safe to how I didn’t know where God was anymore. I even told him that I’d visited his church and I thought he was a jackass.

He laughed hard. And then he shook his head. “That sucks, man. I’m so sorry.”