When Love Shows Up: Weekly Reflections about God’s Presence

Rector’s Blog, When I Don’t Want to Believe - The Rev. Philip DeVaul

There's a line in Scriptures that says faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. I just cannot tell you how much I don't want this to be true. I don't want to hope for things, and I don't want to have conviction in unseen things.
For many years this was a big stumbling block for any kind of religious pursuit for me. I believed in God, but I didn't want to believe in God: I wanted to prove God's existence and get it over with. At that time it seemed pretty clear to me that loving my enemy and praying for those who persecute me and turning the other cheek and giving money away without any desire for reimbursement, and forgiving without reservation and loving without condition would all be much more doable if I knew without a doubt that there was a God and that God unquestionably wanted me to do these things. I was prepared to be obedient if God was prepared to convince me.

Rector’s Blog, Why I’m Religious and Mostly Ok with it - The Rev. Philip DeVaul

Let's get the obvious reason out on the table first: I am religious because I grew up religious and it feels very natural to me. I left church for a while and stopped being religious. This happened when I decided I could not be part of an organization that wasn't gay-friendly (which is the language we used at the time). But when I recommitted myself to the Christian faith and found a church compatible with my values, becoming religious again seemed very natural. I was raised with the understanding that believing in God meant making specific and regular time for that relationship a basic part of my life. It was easy not to be religious when I wasn't sure I believed in God, but once, as an adult, I realized I believed - finding practical ways to practice that belief just made sense to me.
I want to be clear that this is not the same as saying religion is comforting. I hear people say that religion is comforting, and I guess if your goal is to have something that reinforces the notion of life after death and a benevolent force in the universe, then yes that is comforting. It actually is. But my experience of being religious has often been very inconvenient. It is demanding. Being religious has forced me to confront ideas that challenge and upset me, that push and confuse me. Religion means having to deal with and be invested in other people even when I don't want to.
Another reason I am religious is that I cannot always be spiritual. As I said, I used to be spiritual but not religious. I had a spiritual awakening in my younger days, and it was not in a church - it was on a cliffside trail overlooking a beautiful body of water and it was deeply mystical and a moment of deep spiritual awe.

Rector’s Blog, Why I Believe in Jesus for Now - The Rev. Philip DeVaul

I want to begin with the easiest, most obvious, truth about my belief in Jesus - and it's also the one that is the easiest to dismiss. I was raised Christian. My parents were Christians who baptized me as an infant and raised me in a church community. I don't remember a time in my life when God wasn't part of the equation. And I don't remember a time when I took seriously the possibility of being another religion.
I think it's better to be honest about that. I know saying it out loud opens me up to the observation that if I'd been raised Muslim I'd be a Muslim, if I'd been raised Sikh I'd be Sikh, if I'd been raised Jewish I'd be Jewish, and so on. And that is very likely. It would be really impressive if I could say I studied every single religion in depth and then chose Christianity, but that is not what happened. I did not choose Christianity. I did not find Jesus. Christianity chose me. Jesus found me. This is indefensible, and I believe it. Jesus found me.
This, by the way, is called indoctrination. I would like to write more about indoctrination in the future - I think it is misunderstood and gets a bad rap. But for now I'll just say, I don't believe it's possible not to indoctrinate our children. The question is into what shall we indoctrinate them? I am choosing love. Specifically, I am choosing the magnificent, faithful, gracious, sacrificial love of God that I see present in Jesus.
If I was ever going to be anything other than Christian, I would have been an atheist. For much of my life I have been tempted by atheism. Because many times God seems so implausible. But instead of ever really being an atheist, I keep believing in Jesus...

Rector’s Blog, God and Terrible Things - The Rev. Philip DeVaul

Let me say the hardest thing first, so that you can check out early if you want to: I don't believe God is weak or powerless. And that means I believe God allows terrible things to happen. And I believe that I will never fully understand this reality. That may seem like a copout to you, and if so, that's fair enough. But let me say this: I find it odd that we think that we should be able to understand God, God's decisions, and God's actions fully in order to believe in God. I don't understand my wife and I sure believe in her. I don't even understand myself most of the time, but I believe in me too.We say we're made in God's image, and I've come to believe our unfailing inscrutability is one of the things that makes us like God. To say God is mysterious may sound trite, but I still believe it. Because I believe life and love are endlessly mysterious, and God is Love, and God made life. We want God to be the answer of so many things, but so often God is the question.
The second thing I want to say is that I believe God plays the long game. This may actually be my least favorite thing about God. But it's also one of those areas where both Scripture and my personal experience are so consistent, that I have no choice but to believe it. I am writing this in the aftermath of another Election Day - a day that seemed to have enough disappointment in it for everyone. And I notice the yearning that bubbles up within myself each Election Day. Every time, regardless of previous experience, I feel myself wanting the outcome to be clear and definitive. I want justice in one fell swoop. I don't just want my team to win - I want it to be 100%, as if we could all wake up one day on the same page. I don't want to hear that line about the arc of the moral universe anymore. I'm tired of it. I want things to be made right - right now.