🕊 Institutional "Ick" II: A Personal Apocalypse

I hope you are sitting down for this one, Dearest Reader. Perhaps with a coffee or something. I have realised something and I have an announcement to make: I... Am very stupid. This might not be news to you, having walked with me as you have, but several things dawned on me this afternoon that will hopefully be quite helpful moving forward. 

For your sake, I will skip the math because this is already going to be long. The thing is, I was walking home today and using the gap-time between work and home to think about the dream I had this morning... It is still most certainly about the church but it was still not clear whether it cast any light on anything or was simply a dream venting my growing frustrations. The thing is, the very first arranged-marriage dream I'd ever had involved a well-meaning man of considerable age, who made me a number of promises, was quite wealthy and powerful, but of course asked me to give myself to him in a way that I could not, which I confess at the time of the dream was entirely because we had just met. (I tend to like older men, so the only danger otherwise is that if I did come to love him I would likely kill the poor fellow. Ha.) That said, the idea that the marriage candidate in this case was younger struck me, because I didn't know why I would suddenly see the church as younger... But at some point during the day it struck me that it was less to do with youth, and more to do with how my own feelings have changed to see the institutional church as not only flawed but... whelpish. The offensive deed in the dream, that shall continue to remain secret, was indicative of this-- he was excited to exorcise dominion, rather than stewardship. He assumed I belonged to him to disrespect, and in honesty, I am older than that nonsense now. 

But I have not always been. And this is where I have been blind. This is where I have been suffering, and struggling, but it is also the place where I am free now. 

My previous entry "Like a Night in the Forest" did not give proper credit to one in particular I know does love me as I do them, and has always made me feel as such. In fact, it did no one justice, though I know that I am loved, generally, but the former fact has bothered me since. I do not feel abandoned or unloved, but I do not have any form of expression and yes, it does hurt. Do I still wish for things to be different? Yes. 

But the thing is, I spent years steeped in physicality and it was overwhelming and empty. One can, and many do, live a life where the warmth of another body might as well be the artificial warmth of an electric blanket... or just as cold as a wet one. There were words that held no meaning, even though I heard them often, and promises that were made, and never kept. And yet... I have been blessed... I am blessed, with knowing the opposite now. Where there is no touch, no words, but the light that should have filled the rest of my years shines ever present. There are no broken promises. What a treasure. 

And in my solitude where I lament the impossibility of refilling such a brand left in my heart, I have neglected to see that this too, is a gift. Because if there is no other human shape that will suffice, if my eyes fail to see another, then that means that the only way to look is up. 

And what can I do with that, I wonder? Nothing else in my life has been predictable, or conventional... And maybe I can spend my time lamenting all that I have lost... but I can also choose to see what unique gifts I have obtained from such circumstances, and there are many. Again... would I be happier if my situation were suddenly otherwise-- likely yes. The oscillation between carrying grief and longing is exhausting, and maybe I just keep trying to make sense of something that was never meant to. But sometimes things just... are. Maybe we live in a world where things don't always feel good or make sense to us, but to One they do, and maybe that's more than we can hope for. And we give them meaning through how we handle them. And what a shame it would be if I allowed such opportunities as I have to languish, after so much has been poured into me by the hearts of others. 

And so, back to my dream... this dream where I was presented to a whelp that I tried to politely give a chance even though all his authority came from birth and not merit. This child that would be above me, when I belong to my father... I get it now: None of the suitors were ever going to be right. No one but One was ever meant to be right. And whether I do have a loving human partnership one day, or join forces with or within an institution, none of them should ever be close, or eclipse that one most important bond that all of us should be striving to make... and I have not been doing that by choice, only necessity and often begrudgingly. 

I once had a conversation with someone who said they were an atheist because they couldn't believe in a God who gave children cancer. He said he believed in humanity. I told him in turn, that I had lost my faith in humanity long ago, and that's what led me to God. Still, once I found God I only wanted Him to save me that way a trapeze artist wants a net, but only if no one meets them in the air. I conflated the idea of bedrock with landing safely when there is nowhere else one can safely go. This is why I am stupid. Because I know God is bedrock on which we can build greater things, but realistically only things that God would like built on Him, too. And our God is a jealous God. And so I should be thankful that God has not yet shaken me from off his back like water from a duck, because of my continued tendency to idolatry that takes a different form but is no less offensive than those things I criticise the larger church for, and indeed, want no part of.  

We give to each other, we love, we try our best to pass on to those who come after us better tools and circumstances than we had, so that they will do better, and not get stuck on the things we do. There is a time to follow the conventions of the past, and there are times when we are called to different things that serve the future within the ever-changing context of the present. 

It's frightening, but an attempt to go where one is called, even through the dark, and that ends in death, is better than the failure that invariably comes from lack of trying. 

Ἰδοὺ ἡ δούλη κυρίου· γένοιτό μοι κατὰ τὸ ῥῆμά σου.

Dearest reader... Prayer is in order.