Rector’s Blog, Conversions - Part 1 - The Rev. Philip DeVaul

I had been raised Christian but had left my church as a teenager with no intention of returning to organized religion. I had not been traumatized and did not leave angrily. But I increasingly did not see a place for myself in it. In the intervening time, I self-described as Christian, but spent a lot of time really wondering if I believed God was real at all. It really bothered me that I couldn't prove God's existence. I mean, really bothered me. Somehow, in my childhood, I had assumed God was obvious, and when God became anything but obvious, and the church could no longer guilt or scare me into saying I believed, God shifted to an idea or a concept more than a divine being. I was even slightly embarrassed that any of the God stuff mattered to me. It did not seem very cool to care. But I did. I always did. I had no idea what to do with God. And then God spoke.