I recently had the joyous experience of attending a rather... let us just say "informal"... prayer meeting. I'm not sure any amount of money could have provided that level of entertainment, it was incredible. Now I'm sure that if you know me well, you're wondering what in the hell someone like me was doing at a prayer meeting. I'll let your imagination run with that one.... but the lengths I go to for others are truly outstanding and that's all I'm going to say about that....
At first, I had my reservations about attending the event, and I was actually furious with my companion for dragging me into that nightmare. As we stood outside in the cold waiting to enter the building I expressed this emotion. Exasperated, he sighed and leaned down to whisper in my ear "There are many unique experiences to be had in life, and this is one of them!" I just wanted to take his word for it.
When we first walked into the "sanctuary" I was completely delighted. The small cramped room was lined with eight rows of beige metal folding chairs in groups of four, compacted side to side. My mind began to wander into the molecular possibilities of inhaling so many discarded germy atoms from complete strangers in such an enclosed and intimate environment.
At the front of the room there was an elderly black man standing behind an old wooden pulpit. Beckoning to the occupants entering the door, he gestured to the seats. "Welcome! Have a seat, scoot all the way down to make room. Scoot, scoot, scoot!!" Chaos was erupting all around me as some man of unknown age began clamoring for me to sit next to him. I looked down into milky blue eyes set deep in a weather worn face, random smudges of dirt were caked into the crevices of his drooping wrinkles. His faded blonde hair was in a wild disarray of mangled knots like thin pieces of crusty straw shooting out of his sparse and peeling cranium. The dry cracked lips opened slightly to reveal a partially toothless grin as he pointed to the chair next to him. "Um, thanks", I said, trying not to catalog every disturbing facet of what I would have to endure for the next hour, sitting thigh to thigh like lovers with a man who probably hadn't bathed in over a month.
I closed my eyes in silent agony and brushed across the bedraggled worshipper, who had not scooted down, to accept his generous offering. The stinging aroma of stale dried urine assaulted my nostrils and I knew I had only a few choices at that moment. Fight my way through the crowd clogging the entrance, violently if necessary, to escape the madness, breathe through my mouth and accept the fact that I would then have his pungent stench permeating the delicate pores of my tongue, or continue inhaling as is and hope that in time I would develop some form of desensitivity to the painful scent that was raping my brain with its possibilities.
I considered those possibilities while the room overfilled with people waiting for the sermon to begin. What catastrophic flow of devastation occurred that created this forlorn soul next to me? That he was homeless was a given, and I felt a great deal of compassion for his irregularity. I could feel his gaze and without permission, my eyes wandered to meet his. "Cheesiss love you sister" he croaked with that sad toothless grin. Ah....Fate is so unkind, and here this poor unfortunate bastard sits at the bottom of the barrel of life worshipping an invisible sky pixie who reportedly dearly loves all of his followers so incredibly much.
I couldn't help but wonder what it is about religion that blinds people so completely that they can perpetually lie to themselves that they covet a loving deity. Do they even read the bible? The one which portrays God as an abusive neglectful father with a violent temper, what is this fascination for nonsense? I never have been able to figure that out, except perhaps that fear truly can be crippling.... In that moment, I thought I'd rather spend eternity in hell than be a part of the preposterous egotism and insanity that surrounds Christianity and its droning mindless followers. Fighting the urge to enlighten the grungy chump on the details of his gods so called "love", I bit my tongue. "I'm sure he does...." I said.
The sermon leader man behind the wooden pulpit, with no introduction whatsoever, began singing some religiously themed "God is great, God is good" type song, A Capella. I was pleasantly surprised by the even timbre of his voice which was smooth and strong. All around me hands began to wave through the air in rhythm with the tune, typical of fanatical Christians grouped together in close proximity to mimic one another's behavior. Being used to the electronically modified voices of perfection that are emitted from the insanely expensive sound system at Grace Church in Maryland Heights, I couldn't help but admire that these particular simpletons were enjoying their worship with nothing being spent other than the energy it took the singer to produce sound from his body. Nice.
When the tune was finished and the hands were lowered, the ordinary sermonish introductions began by thanking us for gathering together to praise Cheezits. The preacher then claimed he was going to take prayer requests. Prayers.. how glorious. Now we get to pretend we're doing something useful while in fact we'll be doing absolutely nothing at all. "If any of ya gots a need, then let us hear it now!" Bowing his head solemnly he nodded, "We got Steve here toni-ight, he's a prayer warrior and ya prayers WILL be answered cuz he tawk to Gawd!" I smiled in spite of myself, totally intrigued by this new development. A prayer warrior?! What the fu...
Gesturing towards to the left of the room stood Steve. The Prayer Warrior. I studied him carefully for a moment with disappointment. He didn't look like a prayer warrior to me. He looked like a portly middle aged white man in jeans and a striped blue shirt. No fancy shield or glowing golden sword indicating that he can rightfully claim Prayer Warrior status, no magnificent celestial white wings sprouting from his shoulder blades to prove he was the middle man for the Almighty... why was he the prayer warrior?! Was the Prayer Warrior the only one capable of tawking to Gawd? What a crock of shit! What if I can't find my keys tonight and I want to beg petty favors from God, but Steve is asleep or out of cell range? What then!
Steve nodded slowly and looked at the crowd as he took a deep breath and pulled a small notepad and pen from his back pocket, prepared for his heavy labor of demanding deeds from the lord on behalf of the parishioners gathered in the sanctuary. I heard a woman's voice somewhere near the back of the room, "I gotta prayer request for the country and our soldiers!" Hmm, well that sounded noble enough. Steve began jotting down the request while the preacher vehemently agreed. "Amen sister! Anyone else, less give it to Gawd!" A few of the church goers raised their hands and voiced their demands to the Prayer Warrior who was furiously recording the details. Everything from an afternoon heart catheterization to jobs for the unemployed was requested and I was momentarily humbled by the sincerity of those people and their most unselfish requests.
How many times had I partaken in similar events with similar Jesus freaks bartering tricks from God for themselves? Better jobs, bigger houses, improve my health, make my kid behave, bla bla bla with their tired droning. Never mind that according to their own dogma, their god has a PLAN for them. No, no... they want everything they want in their selfishness and greed. Typical Christians running loose all over the planet, doing good deeds only not because they actually should, but because they expect the eternal handout of a golden streeted paradise. Pathetic. However, not one single person in that room requested useless prayers for themselves and I couldn't help but be impressed.
I couldn't tell you the context of the sermon itself, I was distracted by Disturbed's Ten Thousand Fists soundtrack playing through my mind (Yes they know that you've hurt yourself another time, decadence isn't easy, is it? ... No it certainly isn't...) while the preacher blathered on about his god.
On the drive home I wasn't angry with my companion anymore. He had promised me a unique experience and he had certainly delivered that much to say the least. While I'm sure I disappointed his expectations of instilling a greater sense of tolerance for the faithful in me, I did walk away from it with a greater sense of disgust for large churches with wealthy pastoral figures. I was able to join in the festivities of a group of people who had little more to offer one another than prayer itself. There was no million dollar sound system perfecting every syllable of the speakers and singers standing on stages of specialized multi-colored light shows, there was no hazy smoke creating pseudo atmosphere's of serenity and mystique... there were no offering plates passed to collect massive amounts of tax free revenue in a gigantic state of the art facility. No in house bookstores collecting more cash from the simpletons, no cafe and restaurant performing the same cash cow function in what so many greedy fake pieces of shit call "church", just a small room in a small house full of delusional people, and as bizarre as they may have seemed, I had to admire them.
Even if just a little....
