To be honest, I was always into it. I loved the music and the traditions and the pomp and circumstance. I became an altar server and eventually found my way to the choir.
Even when I left home for college and graduate school, I would find my way to a local church on Sundays (evenings, when the hangover from the weekend's shenanigans had disapated). It was important to me and I found myself craving the solace, the peace, the sameness I found in that hour.
Still, there were things (many things) about church and religion that didn't sit well with me, especially as my liberal instincts grew.
I felt myself slipping away. Showing up at mass because it was where I could sing regularly and because it made my mother happy but not taking much from that time.
During that time, I still considered myself "spiritual" but was ready to leave the religion, the church behind.
When I had kids, something changed. Something inside of me longed to feel connected again to something bigger. And in the past few years, that need has only increased.
I've read many books and listened to countless podcasts. About angles and intentions and spirit. About creating our reality and living in the now. About being present and feeling that connection with something bigger. About sitting in the silence and Knowing. About raising your vibration and connecting to your true path.
Not about religion and church.
These things resonated so strongly with me, I wondered how this correlated to my religious beliefs.
I needed to make sense of it, to make it fit.
I needed to reconcile my faith.
So this is how I see it. Faith. I have a strong faith in a power, a divinity that created us and is of us and in us. I believe we all have access to the power of love which creates and connects.
I believe that Jesus Christ was a model of our divine, human potential.
I believe that church can be a building- but it is more important for it to be an action.
I believe that God is everywhere, omnipresent, because he resides in all of us. He is the Light and so are we.
For the first time, I have been able to accept and to make peace with just how strong my faith is and just how much I rely on it.
In the past, that felt weak to me. It felt childish.
But now, I see that it might be the bravest part of me.
I still attend mass (almost) every Sunday, no matter what. I still sing and my son is an altar server. These days, I take much more than I leave. I listen to the words with different ears and hear the things I need to hear.
But I also find church on a run, or in the sunrise, or on a walk. I find church in a conversation with a friend or in a goose bump moment. I find church in the Light shining from my children.
Mass is on Sundays but church is everyday, everywhere.
We are taught that much like politics and money- one should not discuss religion. But my reconciliation has only happened because I chose to talk about it, to think about it, to live it openly.
I can't help but wonder what the world we live in would look like if we all connected more often on this subject. If we shared our thoughts and beliefs the way we share our grievances and pain.
I can't help but think it would help us all to reconcile, to understand, to accept, to open our hearts and minds and do us all some good.
