My Soul Keeps the Score

At my core, I know I'm on a new faith journey. My brain is trying to catch up.

I‘ve always known God, even before I had words to say that I knew him. But lately I feel like I’m getting to know him in a new way. A way I don’t yet understand. It’s a stirring in my soul that feels like molten lava, a shift in my core.

I’m in wonderment to think of my parents bringing me to the church, an infant in their arms, and consecrating me to God, promising to raise me in the way of Jesus as a Catholic. 

Throughout my early years and into high school and college, I operated like a pretty devoted Catholic. But in my mid-20s, I faced a crisis of faith. Not one that put the existence of God into question but more so what particular expression my faith would take. Being Catholic wasn’t making sense to me anymore. Intuitively, I felt like I was a Christian first, and being Catholic was the medium or expression of my Christian faith. But everywhere I turned, the message I got from other Catholics was the same: being Catholic was synonymous if not superior to simply being Christian. I went in search of people who could help me sort out what it means to follow Jesus and whether being Catholic was the path that could help me walk with him.

One priest said he wished he could talk to me but he had a statue to bless. He left me in my existential crisis to go bless a hunk of stone.

Another priest minimized my questions and tried to get me to accept the fact that some things will always be a mystery. I believe this is true—faith is a mysterious thing, and we can’t ever fully know or understand a God who is utterly more than us on every level.

But I wanted to understand how being Catholic could bring me closer to God. Whether practicing Catholic sacraments and rituals would deepen my faith and if the Bible held any of the answers I was seeking.

At this same time in my life, I happened to live near and work with Protestants. Growing up I had never really known anyone outside of the Catholic bubble. My Protestant friends held a belief that Jesus is our personal Savior and apart from him we can’t ever approach God. When we accept his death on the cross for our sins, we are free from sin and receive the gift of eternal salvation.

In many ways, this is the point of infant baptism (or any age baptism)—to acknowledge that we’re born into a sinful world and despite our best efforts to be good, we can’t actually bridge the gap between our efforts and God’s perfect goodness. The only way to be sure you’re going to heaven is to pray the sinner’s prayer—acknowledge your sinful state and accept Jesus as the only antidote for it. 

But none of the Catholics I knew could articulate the Christian faith like this. For all my years being schooled in the Catholic Church, I still didn’t understand what the big deal was about Jesus. Why follow a faith that isn’t certain of what it’s providing or where its beliefs will lead a person?

One time at a backyard barbeque with my relatives and our family priest, I asked, “Some people think there’s a way to know for sure that they’re going to heaven. They believe in Jesus and this is what determines their eternal salvation, not their good deeds. Do you think there’s a way to know for sure if you’re going to heaven?”

The table consensus was that there’s no way to know for sure, and if you live a good life and try to be decent to people, you’ll at least have a shot at heaven, after purgatory of course.

I found this answer completely unsatisfactory, especially seeing the deep certainty my Protestant friends had about their eternal destination. If I was going to remain Catholic, there had to be more clarity of conviction for me to keep following.

I ended up leaving the Catholic church and joined a Methodist church. I delved into Bible studies and prayer groups, and this is where a more adult faith took root.

In my late 40s, I had the chance to travel to Israel with a group of other Christian journalists. When we visited the Jordan River, I opted to get baptized again. I figured if Jesus got baptized in this river, it’d be good for me too. I didn’t see it as a denouncement of my Catholic baptism—more of an expansion pack.

I recommitted my life to Christ and felt the freedom of submerging into water and releasing every sin and barrier to holiness.

Today, nearly 20 years since my re-baptism, I am living alone in a small city in a tiny house where I spend hours each day by myself. It’s a season of deep creativity and reflection. The world is on fire, and I have time to think about it, pray about it and wonder about my role in this chaotic, complicated universe. I’ve been set apart. But for what?

I feel a creative energy bubbling inside me like simmering lava. There’s a force that’s heating up and getting ready to spew forth into the world. I don’t want to tame it or cool it or put any sort of lid on it. I just want to understand it.

I have an overwhelming sense that my life is not my own. It never has been. And yet we’re born into a world that covets individualism and personal autonomy. But I’m not here to find my own personal idea of my life. I’m here to find God’s idea of it. His good purposes for me in this world.

I’m here to help bring heaven to earth. To make Jesus known in the way I live, the way I seek to know others and hear their stories. To honor each unique life I get to intersect with, knowing every human is trying to figure out their own purpose and make sense of their life.

My parents may have signed me up to follow Jesus. But today, I’m making the decision anew to keep following him, eyes wide open, knowing my decision may lead to joy and fullness of life, but also to suffering, persecution, rejection, and any other manner of struggle. I don’t know where this new season of faith will lead me, but I can tell deep inside that I’ve already embarked on a new journey. This is a knowing I feel in my soul. Something my body knows and my brain is just catching up with.

Is my soul in my gut, in my heart, or in some other location in my body? I don’t know for sure. But I feel my questions forming at the center of me in a deep place of knowing and moving to my head and heart. Who knows where they’ll lead from here?