A Reason and Not an Excuse

Today I had a conversation with a long dear friend: Mostly about recent events in my life and the decisions I’ve made to shape them.   My friend said something that resonated profoundly with me.  Both she and I were raised in overly religious and zealous homes.  This in turn conditioned us to fear our mistakes rather than confronting them. We are more likely to feel ashamed, hide behind hand sown leaves or lie in order to avoid punishment.  Judgement in our homes wasn’t met with grace, but with disappointment and a rod.  

The idea reminded me of a friendly stray dog who at the raise of a fist whimpers or attacks out of self-defense.  That’s all the dog has known, but the latter would have it be put down in fear that he could pose a future threat.  Very few people would be willing to work in helping this dog recover and integrate into a healthy family life.  This may at first sound like a gross exaggeration but how one feels post a vigorous religious upbringing, really does make one feel vulnerable and alone at times.  Admitting faults is met with shame and hell fire.  Who wants to be met with these?  

Mix a bit of prosperity theology and you have a convoluted messed up complex.  The  faith declares that a righteous man is met with blessings.  A few and accepted concepts are; wealth, health, a righteous wife, an honorable husband, well-behaved children, my favorite, a lending hand from God when tribulations come your way.  It’s hard to check off the endless list we have created as a collective.  I know when I am lacking, I prefer to pretend all is well until a solution is presented.  Throughout my life, I have made decisions that were done out of fear, desperation, and lack of proper direction.  Mainly because I feared to be cut off by those I loved.  It’s hard to know how one will be met when we reach out for help: It is like asking someone on a date, that imminent rejection weighs heavily on the decision and courage to step out and do it. 

I can say I’ve had a lot of personal growth and I couldn’t be prouder of myself.  I’ve broken off some bad rituals instilled in me, but there is still many to sever along the way.  Becoming unafraid is a big part of this transformation.  I am learning to appreciate and own the consequences of my choices.  They make room for growth and change does not have to be met with harshness.  I suppose most importantly the Bible portrays a picture of a people met with grace and second chances.  More of the tearing down comes from within, but focusing on the promise of a pursuit of happiness is the hope we hold; the anthem that helps us maneuver through this chaotic life.  

There is no story to be told and no lessons to be learned if we don’t allow our lives to unfold with flaws and all.  It’s okay to be vulnerable, it’s okay to lose, it’s okay to err as long as we are learning.  I am accepting that what we hoped for is not easily manifested, it comes with a tale of struggle and one can overcome it.  How we arrive to the land of promise is our very own.  I look forward when we can share our personal account without shame and judgment.  A day in which we incline our ears to hear of the many adventures our brethren took to finally hold the hope they so longed for.

No Longer Intimidated

Every time I was asked by an atheist why God would allow evil things to happen in the world, my response would be,"There is evil in the world because man has freewill;" a superficial answer the church has been propagating since its inception.  It's not God's fault if man chooses to do their own will outside the constructs of his word.  It was this way of thinking that allowed me to excuse God for his lack of interference and shift the blame on others.  God was righteous after all and would never do anything evil or so I believed.  That is, until one day, I woke up and discovered the fallacy in this belief.

"You can't apply human reasoning to God's will," is what my wife said to me the evening I learned that my friend's child had passed away from a heart anomaly.  Those words were key that night as I sat their distraught by this desultory.  Was I really to believe that God was not at fault for this loss?  If God was omnipresent and in all places at all times, then I can deduce that he is present when ill things happen to innocent people and he does nothing to stop it.  Yet, he is not to be blamed because we must believe that as much as he wants to interfere, he must allow humans the freewill to do what they want.  I asked my wife, "If a rapist overcame you and I was in the room and stood by as you were raped, am I to be blamed?" "Yes," she replied.  When asked if God should be blamed, she answered, "No." Somehow, this blame could not be put on God.  I assured my wife that my love for her was so true and that I would fight to the death before I let a man rape her.  Why wouldn't her creator who claims to love her with reckless love, interfere and spare her from the rape?  My inquiries pushed me to hire an investigation on the validity of God's existence.

I never imagined questioning God, I was after all what you could call a devout believer.  I had been raised in Christian doctrine and over time challenged my faith by delving deeper into theological studies.  I had formulated well-thought-out apologetic answers for Christianity.   I was the man who claimed that his faith could not be shaken if the bible was proven false.  I believed nature was sufficient to convince me of his existence and orderly nature.  The message of his salvation was in my DNA, so I believed.  I had heard the good news and knew it to be true without a grain of doubt.  What I didn't realize then, was that I had a cornerstone for the structure of my faith, but it never had a foundation to lie on.  That is because Christianity and even Judaism its predecessor could never offer one.  By the time I realized that I had built a cathedral to the almighty on no foundation, the tumultuous winds of life came through and caused this majestic house of God to tumble.  I had no where else to go for answers.  I was at a loss.

I didn't seek out atheism as an immediate aid.  I was not going to abandon God that easily, he had been an ally for so long, I had to give him the benefit of the doubt.  Who I thought God to be was a jumble at this point.  I couldn't piece him back together again.  I tried.  I even attempted to ignore the nature of God in scripture that did not align with the idea of love. I ignored all the terrible things he had done in the name of righteousness and conspired that man had added to the bible things that God was not.  I was clutching at straws; it was impossible to ignore his wicked nature.  God's mere idea of righteousness created bigotry and that in turn produced hate.  I entertained the idea of two gods, one called Jehovah and the other Jesus.  I had known these two to be one, but perhaps I had been taught wrong.  This idea of polytheism bothered me more than monotheism. I would have to deal with more than one god and this was more overwhelming.  Besides, Jesus turned into a killing machine in the book of Jude, Isaiah, Revelation and a few other prophetic books.  God became what I imagined as ying-yang, good and evil, and I would just need to accept this fact.  I couldn't.  I had to trust this god was balanced, but knowing all too well what he intended to do to those who disagreed with him didn't settle well with me.  I decided to toss the bible out of the equation.  I would believe in a good god who was out there and was misunderstood by Christianity and other religions.  I would become agnostic.  I only had to go out and find him and the truth would be revealed  to me.  How wrong I was.

I felt like an orphan in search of his real parents.  I had no clue whether God was alive, whether he could be found in another religion or if he even cared about me.  Christianity had always filled that void for me.  I was told I was a son, that I had a father, who was very much alive and was waiting for me to return home because I had walked away from him.  He loved me so much, he had offered up himself as a sacrifice as a way for me to return home.  For any wandering orphan this father and home appeals to that void.  The problem was, I had lived in that home and found the master to be finicky on how his household is run.  Wrathful and ready to strip you of any legal rights if you strayed from his rules.  This god was no real father.  He was not love, rather he was coercing me into a continual penance. If there was another father out there who cared for me, he wasn't showing up.  I knew that no one was coming for me and I wasn't going to find anyone who could simply love me unconditionally (that is because God according to the scriptures can only love conditionally). This is when I realized there was no god and no after life.  I became suicidal.  What I was suggesting was thoroughly blasphemous.  I would be blaspheming the holy spirit and the message of salvation.  A war raged within my soul and death almost claimed me.  I want to say I'm exaggerating, but when you have been taught that eternity is in the hands of those who believe in Jesus and hell for those who reject him, how can anyone chose to not believe in him?  I had to let go of this theology and accept the reality of death.  Death was inevitable and would eventually come to all.

Death and I became friends from that day forward.  Death taught me more about life than Jesus and the bible.  Death taught me that I had this one life to live to its fullest.  It taught me that I can make choices that can make lasting impressions on future generations.  I learned that I had the power to change for good and make choices that would make my life fulfilling for me and those around me.  Death taught me freedom like I had never known before.  Death was not an entity I would come to worship, but a friend I would meet eventually.  My legacy would be the one I left behind for family and friends.  They would do the same and the circle of life would continue.   I was no longer afraid of death.  I was no longer intimidated by a wrathful God.  I was free to be myself.  I want to be a good person and that is what I continue to strive for.  I make errors and fall, but I pick myself and dust myself off and try again.  I'm living and that feeling is so real and solid.  I hope it is for you too!

I am Offred

I’d like to imagine that I’m very much like June Osbourne; a free individual in control of his life and making decision without concern about who it affects.  It is not that June isn’t aware or remorseful for her actions: She’s free!  On the other hand, as Offred, she’s trapped in a mouse maze with endless consequences for every decision she makes.  And like Offred, I wonder if she has begun to accept the fact that her life as June never existed.  As I am compelled deeper into the story of The Handmaid’s Tale, a profound desire for her liberation sparks a hope for my very own.  Perhaps, it was Margaret Atwood’s intention all along to remind me that I am Offred. 

I’m sure the female fan base of the novel or tv series, never expected a man to identify with the heroine of this tale, but neither did I.   One day, out shopping, I felt a fear come over me.  The security that surrounded me felt fragile, as if in any moment it would fragment into a different alliance.  I could have soiled my underwear.  It was in that moment June’s story began to blend with mine.  Here I am, Daniel De Leon, a free citizen of the United States; but as if were having a flashback, I snapped back into reality, and there I was staring out of a window in my red handmaid garments:  My sole purpose, to breed children for the republic of Gilead. 

I grew up in a conservative home, not typical for most Hispanic families.  My mother was a religious woman, devout to her faith regardless of the church denomination and its institutions.  I recently told her, that she had taught me her own religion growing up.  It was the bible with her interpretation and her views woven symbiotically.  The churches we attended were no different; it was about their power and control over the individual.  I find it humorous now, recalling my mother’s struggle with the church authority and her plight to carry out her faith independently.    As a widow raising four children, I’m grateful that her faith carried her through our adolescence.  Blessed be!  I was the new generation of conservative Christian to pay it forward.  

I remember being sixteen and rebellious against the Christian faith.  I wanted to be free from religion, but it had a way to ensnare me every time I tried to get away.  Whether, I was trying to lose my virginity and not getting on because all I could hear was my mother’s voice reminding me that it was a terrible sin to engage in premarital sex; or worrying about my flamboyant gestures because they could be the manifest of a homosexual spirit passed on from my grandfather’s family.   It distorted me and beat me down, until all I could do was surrender back into its control.  This kind of surrender, the church called, finding Jesus again.  These were the moments, when Aunt Lydia would step in and remind that God had blessed me with such a post.  Christianity has a way to make it look right.  How can you argue with right? Sprinkle a few emotions and you are nostalgically renewed to the faith. 

I wanted to believe that as an adult, it would all change.  Somehow, I would be this strong-willed individual and break free, but the education I had been afforded paved the groundwork for my adulthood.  It reminds of the verse in Proverbs, “Train the child in the way he should go, and he will not depart from it.” My social circles shared similar beliefs and only encouraged me more to break off relationships with ‘unhealthy’ individuals.  I had swallowed the pill and there was not turning back.   How could I?  They own my family and me.  If I want freedom, I have to abandon my family as it is stated in Exodus 21:4-6, “If his master has given him a wife, and she has borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be his master’s, and he shall go out by himself.  But if the servant plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’  then his master shall bring him to the judges. He shall also bring him to the door, or to the doorpost, and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him forever.” In the words of Offred, “Father who Art in heaven, what the actual fuck!”  You think I’m exaggerating?  What if I stopped believing in the bible or came out of the closet per se, what would my Christian conservative wife do?  Stay with me, work it out, and let her children’s morals be tainted by a sinner?  The law is clear; I would go out by myself and lose everything or like June, remain an Offred, until I knew my children were safe.  How can I run to freedom, when my children are slaves to the same system? 

There you have it, the reality of which I am Offred.  My faith in God isn’t challenged, it’s how I’ve been made to perceive Him.  My worldview and politics had been defined, not by my faith, but the religion that drove it.  I’m changing and I’m okay with that.  My hope is to see Daniel De Leon one day, but if I don’t, I hope I see the De Leon children in a free world.    I have to fight against Gilead, that’s what Jesus did in His day.  He fought and set many free from the religious system.  My plight is the same as the Apostle Paul, “Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?”  May the Lord open!