September 3, 2014 - Written by: Beth Teverson

Dear God… I Hope You Get the Message

I’ve been asked this question quite a lot recently:

Are you religious?

And I never know what to say. It’s hard to answer. It’s usually someone creating a sort of safety net so as not to offend as they parallel religion with a form of mental illness. I mean, by Christian standards, I was always pretty liberal.

I’m not an atheist, I guess you could say I’m under the category ‘Agnostic theist’ and yes, I don’t really know what that means either.

I went to Sunday School for about 14 years.

I was never forced to go although I do remember being irritated when, once a month, it was the “family service” and instead of being in the warm, fun environment of the town hall we had to sit in the barn of a church. No central heating, 80% of the people there were over 70 and the plates of biscuits at the end were reserved purely for adults.

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God was always there, in the back of my mind. In fact, I don’t ever remember questioning whether he existed. I loved the stories from the testaments. I never shoplifted and I always had a sense of security. When I was twelve I was baptised and confirmed and then about a month later the Vicar left our church because he’d had an affair with one of the Sunday school teachers – I know right?

It ripped our community apart. I know it must have had some effect on me because I mention it in my (not so regularly written) diary. It did make me question how God could let that happen?

I knew, of course, that question could never be answered lightly so I kept to it.

I grew older and moved up through Sunday school and started attending Youth Group. We all went to a Christian festival called ‘Soul Survivor’. The place was full to the brim of incredibly extroverted Christians, and bands with lame-ass guitar songs. I enjoyed it, partly because I’d never been to a festival before, but I felt very isolated.

I remember standing in the huge communal marque with thousands of other people, all with their hands in the air dancing and praying and they were just so in love with existence. And then the leader guy, wearing some African tribal shirt holds up his hands and says ‘Come to us Lord’ and then I start to hear screaming, and laughter and crying.

A girl next to me fainted and when she came to she told me how she had talked to her grandfather and he’d told her everything was going to be okay. So the next day in the same tent I closed my eyes and I breathed in and out and as the guy stood saying ‘Come to us Lord’ again and again I felt so ready. I had heard most people experience a feeling of extreme warmth, not heat just warmth. So I waited and I waited and I looked around as I could hear other people screaming and crying and laughing again… but it didn’t come. I began to realise just how uncomfortable I felt so I left and sat outside.

It wasn’t that I stopped believing in God but I knew I didn’t want to practice my religion in this way anymore. These extroverts at Soul Survivor, I imagine, are what many people think of when they ask me “are you religious?” In the same way that since 2001 many people associate Islam with terror, extreme misogyny and hatred of the West. Extremism makes a good story and it’s easier to believe.

As time went by I guess God became less and less a part of my life. It’s only now that I’m starting to think about it all again.

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We are living in an increasingly secular society and it’s getting harder to explain why you believe in God. Do I believe in God because I’ve grown up believing it? Do I really read the bible as gospel? I mean by Christian standards I was always pretty liberal.

I never once thought that homosexuality was wrong or that sex shouldn’t happen before marriage. I even shoplifted once: self-service machines just make it too goddam easy.

And since when do I have the time to figure out my religious views? – I have a full time job and a social life.