No Acoustic Guitars, Ever

I have always had a complicated relationship with religion. I was, and am, the kind of Catholic who would never dream of sitting forward of the third row, who can't sing, who inwardly critiques 50% of every homily and who cringes every time a parish member does anything remotely resembling a testimonial.

And if an acoustic guitar comes out, forget it.

I come by it honestly. My mother breaks out in hives when our church back home breaks the fourth wall and parades around the quad during Lent. She is also the one who described church to me as "a good time to think." To think about what? Anything on your mind. Anything else? I had to come up with that on my own. I would, however, as I have mentioned before, be forced attend years of Sunday school. In hindsight this was, I suspect, partly to get me on the communion-reconciliation-confirmation highway, which became a lot more difficult when you weren't enrolled in some kind of Catholic school, even if it was just one day a week.

Imagine my surprise, then, in high school, to find myself writing a play about priests. A play about priests that tried (and succeeded, I think) to sidestep clichés and present a multifaceted take on Catholicism. Part of this had to do with several interesting articles I had recently read, but part of it was down to the awesome priest at the church we had recently switched to who spoke in something other than a rhythmic monotone and who showed more than flashes of humor and creativity and public speaking skills and who seemed like a genuinely nice and charismatic person.

So church was very much on. And then it was off again in Princeton, where I tried a couple times to attend and failed dramatically as work piled up and as homilies failed to latch on. I also stopped writing, for similar reasons, and then was surprised when the creative writing program rejected me outright. In hindsight, I shouldn't have been surprised at all. Among other things, I had given up on "time to think."

Last night I was talking to a friend of mine about how religion is so weird, about how it's practically the last taboo subject of conversation among the people we spend time with. Or, not really. Religion in general is fine. Personal religion is out of the question. I definitely see that. One of the strangest things about my job this year is that practically everyone--if not everyone--belongs to some Christian denomination. Talking about church at work is far from uncommon. When the kids were asked to enter a holiday card design contest, they had to be reminded multiple times not to include the words "Merry Chirstmas," and even then they didn't fully understand why, or succeed in following directions.

Last night I explained to my friend that I have a Get Out of Jail Free card on both sides of the fence. To church-going people, I explain that I also go to church. To nonbelievers, I can confidently say, "But I'm really liberal." (What would I say to conservative atheists? I've never met any.) Why do I feel like I need to play such a card? The Awkwardness, the societal version and my own.

Is "time to think" prayer? Some Sundays it definitely is. Other times it really is just a running catalog of introspection. Most of the time, I'm not sure that the line between the two can be all that firmly drawn. Either way, since I started going to church again here in Chicago, I've also started to come out of my two-year writing slump (the one that plagued my existence and sort of brought on an identity crisis).

Have I reached any conclusions? No, it's just interesting. I'm not asking too many questions; I'm just writing for my life.