An Atheist Goes to Bible Study
“When you were growing up your mother and I decided to let you choose your own religion,” my father says with a stressed voice and a fake smile, “we didn’t expect you not to choose one!”
I’m not sure what my parents expected. I was raised into it. Logic won out, and I became an atheist.
My Sunday school was “The Waltham Philosophy School.” It was a weekly hour drive to ponder perception and the complete works of Aristotle. In one room the children were being read stories of “just wars” fought in the age of antiquity. In the next room the adults were debating whether the Self can perceive its own existence (nope).
While I was learning the merits of meditation, other children were learning stories of an ark that must have carried millions of different beetles. While I learned the importance of maintaining a still mind, other children learned the importance of not masturbating. In my house we had a Bible on the shelf, but it was dusty, and hidden behind a large bust of Socrates.
For me there is no magical world beyond this one. Prophecies predicting impossibilities don’t hold water, on which God’s baby boy never walked. There was no self-immolating bush, or fantastic alcoholic water. A man cannot part a sea, and the dead never come back to life unless it involves electric-shock paddles and a quick response.
Because I have always rejected the idea of a God, religion seems like a ridiculous waste of time. Despite my Christian surroundings I give the Bible as much respect as Stephen King’s less inspired works. Recently I found a Bible in a friend’s dorm room:
“Why do you have this?” I said, “Are you religious?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Because…” I tried to begin a debate, but it wouldn’t take. I asked for evidence, she pointed to the book. I asked for logic, she pointed to the book. I asked her about the contradictions, and to tell me how the rules even made sense. I asked her how anyone in this day and age could ever hold a book that was poorly translated, outdated, with impossible stories, as something to base their life on. She said I should go to Bible study and find out.
So I went.
* * * *
Bible study was held in a furnished attic. Three floors up, people sat on clean carpet, a blue futon or on a khaki colored leather two-seater. There was a television with a DVD player. The windows beside the television were curved with an angled frame to fit below the sloping roof.
“Okay now, choose two or three people to read this passage with. Take notes, then we’ll discuss it as a group.”
After we had read the passage, we went in a circle, each person saying what the passage meant to them.
“Glorious”
“Beautiful.”
“I feel so inspired—it really show me that Jesus will always be there for me.”
Then came my turn: “It doesn’t make sense.” There were no sidelong glances or hostile sighs. They tried to explain it to me it still didn’t make sense.
Eventually I stopped arguing and started observing. It felt like everyone in the room had a polite confidence in themselves. Each word was dipped with calm. They didn’t interrupt each other or disagree. The Bible was their guide, and truth was inherent. They spoke, and sat, and breathed in a flow of what they thought life was meant to be. I decided attend next week.
One week later I was sitting on the edge of the blue futon closest to the television. Pens and paper were handed out. We were going to watch a video, take notes, and then discuss it. The video began playing—on screen was a man in a suit with close-cropped hair and an organized beard. He had a strong composure and a powerful voice with which he howled into a wireless headset.
“Praise the Lord!” The preacher would say mid-sentence. Praise the Lord, the audience followed him in slow echo.
The preachers described a man he knew who had been infected with powerful demons. The demons would turn on lights. The demons would start cars. Jesus Christs cured the man of these demons. Jesus Christ guided the man to the truth. And, to this very day, the man is walking the path of righteousness.
The audience was sitting in a large carpeted amphitheater, all the seats full. The audience looked to be mostly older housewives, with an occasional man wearing a formal sweater. Hairspray held the womens' hair in twisted, impossible directions.
The camera flashed to a red haired woman with a beehive hairdo. She pushed a large pearl necklace away and continued writing in a small notebook.
“Praise Jesus,” the preacher's face was turning red, his forehead sweaty. His confident composure grew into something pseudo-manic, like a steroid user on PCP. Another slow echo.
The preacher went through each sentence of a Bible passage and explained his interpretation of each word. Definition after definition seemed slightly skewed. The preacher was twisting the words to create a wild interpretation that was purely his own.
The red-haired woman on screen again, furiously scribbling the preacher’s words. Another slow echo.
I waited for others to giggle at the video so I could begin laughing. I looked around the room. Almost everyone was taking notes.
I felt sick. I was scared. I had to leave.
“Later, guys,” I said.
“Bye, Sky,” the Bible study echoed.
* * * *
The next, and last, Bible study I attended was “to be between you and the Lord,” which meant candlelight and a laptop quietly playing Christian soft rock. We were encouraged to copy Bible verses onto construction paper or write our own words of worship.
Some were reading the Bible, others copying it. Many were writing their own words of worship, while one boy was looking into the flame of a candle he held between his sneakered feet. Above where I was sitting hung a pink piece of construction paper. “Praise the Lord for the life he has planned for you,” it read.
I thought about what a boy had said during the first Bible study. He explained that between Bible Study on Tuesday and Church on Sunday there was a long stretch of time. During this time he began to “forget what the whole point of this is.”
“Why am I going to school?” he said. “I mean… what’s the real meaning? Then I come to study and God shows me the way and I know where I’m going. I thank God for the strength to go on.”
Walking back to my dorm that final night I considered the idea there was a benevolent God who had designed my life. A dull peace came over me as I flirted with the belief that my life had a plan.
Life is a struggle, a fight towards a goal we only think exists because we exist. In Bible study I would forget that pressure. Believing your life has a plan is the most powerful drug.
I was calm as I stepped off the curb and into the street. Suddenly, brakes squeeled, a horn honked, I jumped back and the driver flipped me off.
Reality asserted itself.
