God versus me and the game I once loved, along with the advice given me by a man named Ben, which all began when I was:
HOME AGAIN IN DENVER, AFTER NINE MONTHS AWAY...
AND QUICKLY FELL INTO THE ERNEST RHYTHMS OF the late 1950's. Necessity was the goad; I needed to come to some decisions and get on with my life. I had finished my first year in the Lutheran Seminary, and as it had come to an end, I thought more about my future and was unclear as to whether I did or did or did not want to return in the fall. My future remained only a perhaps. Up to that point, I had tried very hard to believe in God. From first grade on, I was certain that I wanted to become a minister like my grandfather was. I memorized endless pages of the Lutheran Catechism, and even won prizes for reciting in a singsong way the questions and answers of the text. Who made the world? God made the world. Who is God? God is the creator of heaven and earth. What is man? Man is a creature composed of the body and soul, and made to the image and the likeness of God. Why did God make you? God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world. Where is God? God is everywhere.
The problem was that I didn't know if I now believed any of this. On the surface, I was a reasonably good Seminary student. Scholastically, I stood at the top of my class. As I grew into the age I was back then, I had loved the baroque paintings on the walls of the church. I admired the statues of the flayed Jesus and grieving mother. I loved the music, with the great booming hymns on Sunday mornings, I even liked the smell of candles, palm leaves at Easter, pine needles at Christmas. But I began to find out that I loved the game of baseball more.
This was one of the heaviest secrets that I carried all throughout my youth. I couldn't talk to my mom or dad about my terrible failure of imagining a baseball diamond rather than a clerical collar in my future. Although I loved his cartoony name, I didn't really care about the Holy Ghost, the Blessed Trinity, or Original Sin. And with significant reflection, I came to understand that the intricacies of the game of baseball meant more to me than the felony of mortal sin, which I was certain that God would eventually bestow on me with the vengeance of eternal damnation. For a long time, I even began to wonder what God actually gave any thought at all about the game I loved to play, and if He didn't, why did He invent it?
One trouble with the Lutheran Church is that I was certain it didn't follow its own rules. It certainly didn't seem to care passionately about the poor. It shamed us into contributing money every November, a month that they called Stewardship Month, and published our names in the church bulletin along with the amounts of donations. While the altars were heavy with gold chalices and seminaries and pastors drove cars and grew fat, I never saw them down in the slums of Lamar Street at the edge of Denver's downtown. I never saw them in picket lines, or join in the fight against the bosses who were degrading workers. After sex, most of their negative passion back then was reserved for communism. The pastors would seldom help the down-and-out; all they ever did was judge them. None of this made any sense to me.
So I carried my growing disbelief with me, even as I entered the seminary. For whatever reason, I believed I was chosen by God to become a minister. But if anything, my time in the school of theology widened my separation from the Church. I got up every morning, fall and winter and spring, gripped my books under my arm and traveled up the hill to morning chapel. But from the beginning I felt part of a show, giving a rehearsed performance in which the lines never varied. I loved the sound of New Testament Greek, the roll of the vowels, the way the words changed according to their meaning; it was another code to be cracked along with Hebrew. But even for the professors, it seemed to me that it was all an act. Just as I couldn't tell anyone the truth that I wasn't certain I believed in God, I couldn't talk to many people about loving baseball more.
I did like one of the pastors, particularly a kind man named Ben Weaver, who happened to be the pastor of Messiah Lutheran Church in Denver. It was my home parish. The one in which I had grown up. Pastor Weaver looked like a pastor ought to look. Handsome. With a great smile. He even made the smoking of a cigarette seem somewhat appropriate. I scheduled an appointment to meet with him in order to voice my doubts about my own faith.
Even at six-thirty in the morning, which was the only time he had for me on the following day, he looked as if he had just stepped-off of the pages of an Arrow Shirt ad in the Sears Catalogue. He listened intently to what I had to say. It was bad enough that I had to confess the doubts I had about my faith, facing a man I greatly admired, but the more I talked, the more he began to smile. I thought that was every strange, but kept on talking, anyway. When my tirade came to its inevitable conclusion, I thought that it now might be the time to hide my eyes and bow my head, and ask that my sins would forever be forgiven in order to be saved from this humiliation.
It was then that he asked: What do you think that you ought to do about it, Dick? Continue to play Play more baseball or edge back into your Seminary education to begin a career to which you believe that you have been called by God to perform? Before you answer, I want you to think about something. Would that be okay with you?
Yes, sir, I replied.
I assume, and correct me if I am wrong, that you also believe in the basic ideology of the Lutheran Church that man has been endowed with Freedom-of-Will? he said.
I do, I answered.
He gave a small smile.
Good, he said, at least we agree on something. It seems to me that both of us are now off to a good start. I also hope that you agree with that.
I agree, I said.
Then you wouldn't mind if I took a moment or two to tell you what I believe? he asked.
Not at all, I replied.
I believe that the God I worship has never created anyone like I am, he began, nor will there ever be an individual created by Him that is identical to me in the future. It is, therefore, up to me and only me to come to a conclusive decision as to where I stand when it comes to my own belief in a Supreme Being. And that goes for you, as well. The choices you make are the ones which you will forever be responsible. It is like your game of baseball that you love so much. You pick up a glove, try it on, and somewhere along the line, you will find a perfect fit...
...I did, of course, follow his advice...
...And up until now, at the ripe-old-age of 78...
...It seems to have turned into an entirely delicious journey full of hope and free of doubt...
...I also have the memory of a fine and decent man who sent that gift my way...
This was one of the heaviest secrets that I carried all throughout my youth. I couldn't talk to my mom or dad about my terrible failure of imagining a baseball diamond rather than a clerical collar in my future. Although I loved his cartoony name, I didn't really care about the Holy Ghost, the Blessed Trinity, or Original Sin. And with significant reflection, I came to understand that the intricacies of the game of baseball meant more to me than the felony of mortal sin, which I was certain that God would eventually bestow on me with the vengeance of eternal damnation. For a long time, I even began to wonder what God actually gave any thought at all about the game I loved to play, and if He didn't, why did He invent it?
One trouble with the Lutheran Church is that I was certain it didn't follow its own rules. It certainly didn't seem to care passionately about the poor. It shamed us into contributing money every November, a month that they called Stewardship Month, and published our names in the church bulletin along with the amounts of donations. While the altars were heavy with gold chalices and seminaries and pastors drove cars and grew fat, I never saw them down in the slums of Lamar Street at the edge of Denver's downtown. I never saw them in picket lines, or join in the fight against the bosses who were degrading workers. After sex, most of their negative passion back then was reserved for communism. The pastors would seldom help the down-and-out; all they ever did was judge them. None of this made any sense to me.
So I carried my growing disbelief with me, even as I entered the seminary. For whatever reason, I believed I was chosen by God to become a minister. But if anything, my time in the school of theology widened my separation from the Church. I got up every morning, fall and winter and spring, gripped my books under my arm and traveled up the hill to morning chapel. But from the beginning I felt part of a show, giving a rehearsed performance in which the lines never varied. I loved the sound of New Testament Greek, the roll of the vowels, the way the words changed according to their meaning; it was another code to be cracked along with Hebrew. But even for the professors, it seemed to me that it was all an act. Just as I couldn't tell anyone the truth that I wasn't certain I believed in God, I couldn't talk to many people about loving baseball more.
I did like one of the pastors, particularly a kind man named Ben Weaver, who happened to be the pastor of Messiah Lutheran Church in Denver. It was my home parish. The one in which I had grown up. Pastor Weaver looked like a pastor ought to look. Handsome. With a great smile. He even made the smoking of a cigarette seem somewhat appropriate. I scheduled an appointment to meet with him in order to voice my doubts about my own faith.
Even at six-thirty in the morning, which was the only time he had for me on the following day, he looked as if he had just stepped-off of the pages of an Arrow Shirt ad in the Sears Catalogue. He listened intently to what I had to say. It was bad enough that I had to confess the doubts I had about my faith, facing a man I greatly admired, but the more I talked, the more he began to smile. I thought that was every strange, but kept on talking, anyway. When my tirade came to its inevitable conclusion, I thought that it now might be the time to hide my eyes and bow my head, and ask that my sins would forever be forgiven in order to be saved from this humiliation.
It was then that he asked: What do you think that you ought to do about it, Dick? Continue to play Play more baseball or edge back into your Seminary education to begin a career to which you believe that you have been called by God to perform? Before you answer, I want you to think about something. Would that be okay with you?
Yes, sir, I replied.
I assume, and correct me if I am wrong, that you also believe in the basic ideology of the Lutheran Church that man has been endowed with Freedom-of-Will? he said.
I do, I answered.
He gave a small smile.
Good, he said, at least we agree on something. It seems to me that both of us are now off to a good start. I also hope that you agree with that.
I agree, I said.
Then you wouldn't mind if I took a moment or two to tell you what I believe? he asked.
Not at all, I replied.
I believe that the God I worship has never created anyone like I am, he began, nor will there ever be an individual created by Him that is identical to me in the future. It is, therefore, up to me and only me to come to a conclusive decision as to where I stand when it comes to my own belief in a Supreme Being. And that goes for you, as well. The choices you make are the ones which you will forever be responsible. It is like your game of baseball that you love so much. You pick up a glove, try it on, and somewhere along the line, you will find a perfect fit...
...I did, of course, follow his advice...
...And up until now, at the ripe-old-age of 78...
...It seems to have turned into an entirely delicious journey full of hope and free of doubt...
...I also have the memory of a fine and decent man who sent that gift my way...
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