Saved

“How could they think that about me?”

My girlfriend and I were talking to a couple’s counselor. Of course, the counselor wanted to hear about our pasts, and our relationships with our families. I really didn’t think it would be a big deal.

I started talking about my alienation from my family because of religion. I said that according to their beliefs I was going to hell, and when I started saying “How could they think that about me?” I really totally lost it. Out of nowhere, the flood gates opened and I was really sobbing for the first time in a very long time. I didn’t even know how much it hurt me that I could never be close to them.

If I have one wish for religion it is this: that it always helps people connect to themselves and people around them as who they really are. The problem with salvation theology is that it strips our humanity away to be replaced with a stamp from god. You can never see past that stamp and therefore you can never really connect with anybody.