Not Especially About Pain

I recently came across this post in draft form. I wrote it almost exactly one year ago, and I don't know why I never published it. I like it, and I think it relates to some of my more recent thoughts. Some parts of what I've written here have changed in the past year (for example, I'm not nearly so bitter with God, and it turns out my hair does look good long) and other parts have stayed the same. I still think it's interesting, but then, I'm probably more interested in my own out-of-date thoughts than anyone else. My next post about pain is nearing completion, but in the mean time, this is me a year ago:

It's Christmas time, I'm off school, and come to think of it, today's my birthday. But none of this is particularly exciting right now. The world is cold and grey. I don't know what I believe, but I know it's not what I want to believe. I'm confused, and I know I'm not smart enough or diligent enough for this task. God seems not to be on side, and that doesn't help. I feel at peace about the process I've engaged myself in - the process of questioning and fighting through my faith. I know this is what I should be doing, but I also know that I cannot do it well. I know that I'm too emotional, too lazy, too tired and skeptical and too human to find God or truth. So the problem is not that what I'm doing is wrong, it's that I am doing it poorly, and I cannot do it better. I've been dwelling a lot on hell, and I don't know how much of what I've written on this will ever be published here, but it's fairly discouraging.

What I've read in the past 24 hours: part of an old book about why the KJV is the only Bible translation you should read, and parts of another book about why the Charismatic movement is bad and miracles ceased after the NT was written. Neither seemed particularly well thought through or honest.

Random stuff: I'm thinking about people I know, and their various viewpoints. I talked to a girl the other day who is no longer a Christian, and who says that rejecting Christianity was the most wonderful, uplifting experience of her life. I talked with my relatives about Christianity and the Bible, which they hold to be the inspired word of God. I talked to various people about hell, and how to reconcile the doctrine of hell with my beliefs about God's goodness. I talked to friends who are struggling with the church, friends who are walking away from the church, and friends who embody the church. I talked with a few people about how the direction I'm headed will cause me to be more and more detached from the church, simply because I will be less and less able to volunteer in Christian ministry. I was kissed twice this week: once by my grandma, who's in the hospital, and once by a mentally ill homeless man. It's 5:00 right now, and it's cold and dark out. I have a party to go to tonight. I generally hate parties, but I was at a good one the other day. People are dying in the world today. I'm feeling melancholic, and I'm not wearing socks. It looks like Hotel Rwanda may not be playing in Edmonton. Has anyone talked with God lately? How is he doing? I hear he might be in Africa. I don't think I really like him. He's done a lot of bad stuff in the past, and he doesn't seem to be sorry for it. He's pretty icy, hard to get close too. I think I may resent the fact that he's the center of my life. Everything I think about and do revolves around him, and he knows it. I wish I could go a day without thinking about God, just living, loving, doing stuff, and not bothering about prayer or ethics or the problems in Jude. I wish I could just be myself and sort of have my own ideas about God and religion that don't come to the surface unless someone asks me about them. And then I could think for a bit and explain some of how I feel about God and stuff, and we could chat about it or whatever, but it wouldn't be me, you know? It wouldn't be what I'm all about.

I think one of the big problems with me is that I'm afraid of hell. I guess most people are, but it's so stupid. Just do your best - that's all you can do. And maybe someday when you're dead God will say "sorry, you thought the wrong stuff, so damn you", or maybe he won't. He chose not to make this straight-forward. That was his choice, not mine. I can't get myself all bent out of shape about something I really have no control over. If I wasn't afraid of hell, I think I could do a lot of things with my mind.

One thing I really value in my friends is their differences. I have friends that are a lot like me, and others that are so different. I grow when I interact with them, because they stop my thoughts from becoming inbred and redundant. But I wish I had more diversity in my friends. I don't make friends easily, is the problem, but if I had my choice I'd have Mormon and Jewish and Muslim and Catholic and atheist friends, and gays and feminists and humanists. I'd have some friends that were really smart, but others that weren't. Some of my friends would be open and tolerant and great to talk to, but others would be closed-minded and a little irritating. Some of my friends would like to go to coffee shops, and I'd go with them and talk about global responsibility and philosophy and love. As long as I'm wishing, I'd also like the taste of coffee and Chinese food. My hair would look good long, and I'd be able to play the guitar. I'd probably have a girlfriend.

(That was a segway.) I found myself wishing I had a girlfriend the other day. Not in a "oh man, I need get a girlfriend soon" way, but in a kind of whimsical, "some day it would be cool" way. My girlfriend would be smart and honest, and I'd think she was very pretty, though she wouldn't believe me, because girls are weird like that. She'd be someone who I could be very, very real with. She'd know me better than anyone else; she'd be like the second me. She wouldn't know me perfectly, because that's impossible, but she'd know me about as well as I know me, and she'd have a different view of me, and I'd come to her to try to find out who I am. She'd play the piano, I guess. Or the guitar, but I'm already pretending I play the guitar. I don't care, it could be the other way around, or maybe one of us plays the violin or something. But it couldn't be a wind instrument, because you have to be able to sing while you play. I would lie on my bed reading poetry by candle light, and she would come over without calling first and practice her violin, playing sad songs and singing in French, and I'd pretend to keep reading, but I'd just listen to her voice and her violin making beautiful sounds I didn't understand, and she'd know I was listening more than reading because I'd start to cry. I just wish I had a #1, you know? A best, best friend, but more than that.

I think the god-shaped hole is a myth. I think we have a something-shaped hole, but no one really knows what the shape is exactly. I doubt anyone's ever done a good job of filling this hole with God. Not that God couldn't fill it, maybe, but he doesn't. He just sits up there and does whatever he does (probably holds the world together or something) and he's not that interested in filling your hole.