(This is part 2 of a journal entry that I wrote during my deconversion process. This one's more of a "rant", as I was just venting my frustration over the realization that my life was not a reflection of all I had believed in my whole life.)

September 11, 2011

This is the first time in my life I’ve allowed myself to think this honestly and to be this real with myself. I mean, I’ve done my share of ranting and raving with my fingers on my keyboard…hashing it out with God and asking some tough questions. But I’ve never reached this crisis-level of faith before. I was afraid to let myself come here. The way to this place is pretty dark and scary, I must say. Letting myself really consider that I could have been wrong about this whole Christian thing my entire life…yeah, scary as hell (no pun intended). But it is also refreshing, in a weird sort of way. And right now I can honestly say there isn’t much that refreshes or encourages me in this Christian life. So yeah, let me just take that rabbit trail…

Christian slogans, buzz phrases, catch words and clichés, oh my! How I have grown tired of them. If I don’t hear another one it will be the first full-blown miracle I’ve ever personally experienced! Maybe I am just cynical and jaded, but I have just developed this utter intolerance to the ideas and words we latch onto in order to pump us up and keep us going. I have such an aversion to it all right now. And not all of it is bad or wrong, necessarily. It’s just so…ineffective. That is the word. It’s not that all of these things people say is wrong or even cheesy – some of it even seems cool and thought provoking. But, like my husband likes to ask when I buy a new décor item for the house, “What does it DO?”

What do these words DO to actually change anything? How do they accomplish actual change or progress in a person’s actual life? I think for all of us who go through an extended time of a struggle in our lives, there’s a period where words are effective and meaningful to us. But after awhile, words just become meaningless. And words and phrases which are formulated to motivate and inspire just become, at best, annoying! To quote a line of a song from one of my all-time favorite movies, “My Fair Lady”, “Words, words, words! I’m so sick of words!”

I guess what I’m getting at is that, I’m so tired of everything feeling like it’s so damned complicated. I can’t get my head around a God who would set a up a system where everything He promises us is so illusive and hard to grasp and actually experience. What would be the point of that? I can’t imagine asking my child to suffer and die for my other children so that they could have his inheritance. Then after he dies I tell the kids they get all he had coming to him, but, well there’s this catch – it’s invisible. But don’t worry, if you believe it anyway one day you can see it. Oh, I’m so sorry you are hungry and sick right now. But remember – you have this inheritance! Yay! What, you can’t see it? Oh I know, I told you, it’s invisible! Yay! Don't you feel better?!

REALLY?!