Sometimes, I think there’s a god. Drowsy and with eyes half-lidded, I’ll make my way to the bus stop. Under the glow of a sunrise, I’ll pause to stare at the scripture posted on telephone poles, stapled on top of missing cat posters and ads for cleaning services. In the middle of the empty sidewalk, a few cars drive past, and with their headlights illuminating the dim dawn-soaked paths, I’ll read those holy pamphlets. They speak of sin, and I wonder what my life would be like if I gave in—if I let the garbled religious thoughts dictate more than shame. Can one exist without the other? Everything I do has a layer of blasphemy over it, slick and immovable. It’s that old Catholic guilt. It’s something I never earned. I went to public school, I never read the bible with pious intent, and I never clasped my hands before me with conviction. Still, I had to overcome the hesitation to gasp “Oh my god!” worrying I would upset someone I don’t believe in. Religion settles in the curves of a mold I was forced to grow into. It’s the spot on my dress I can’t scrub out. It’s there whether or not there’s a heaven or hell.
I wonder who I would be if I read the bible and believed it. At age nine with my thumbs coated in black ink, I sat on the floor of my grandma’s bedroom beside her bookshelf with a pocket-sized bible. The font was too small, so I held a magnifying glass up to it. Maybe because of this, I saw something I wasn’t supposed to. I read about how god made light, formed Adam in his image, gave Eve one purpose, and I laughed at the thought of a talking snake. Nothing resonated with me that day. I didn’t feel enlightened or burdened with the weight of my supposed sins. But the things people would say in shows, books, and in school polluted my innate skepticism. Those virtuous preachers made promises of a pearlescent afterlife and the many ways I could be forbidden entry. They told stories of past miscreants that filled me up with an odd sense of déjà vu. They would tell me what I could and could not do, and for some reason, it stuck. I think that’s why I eat apples with a sort of reverence. The first fruit—though, that isn’t true. Earthly delights savoured, scoured, stolen. Teeth sink in, and somehow, I’m Eve again. I don’t think I could resist temptation; every time it stands before me, fresh and bloody red, I reach toward it without hesitation just to know what it felt like way back when.
A man yells “God is dead!” on the sidewalk in front of the mall. People turn and sneer at him, teenagers giggle to one another behind closed fists, parents clasp their children’s ears and tug them closer to their side. Is it sacrilegious to just stand by and watch? If god is dead, did he ever exist at all?
There’s a church on the corner of my street, blue-walled with a white wooden cross standing on the jut of its roof. On Sundays, I see people dressed in their finest walk down that long aisle of steps. Marble-like concrete, consecrated and holy beneath their leather and suede-clad feet. They part like the Red Sea for the priest to walk through the middle, and they bow their hatted heads as he passes. They seem comfortable in the familiar atmosphere. For me, it’s foreign territory. I have only attended church a few times, all when I was little. I would go hand in hand with my grandma, wearing a gold cross around my neck and a long summer dress. I would hold the plush leather-bound book in my hands and let my eyes trace over the words to each of the hymns they sang. I would dig my nails into the squishy cover and watch the indents disappear.
My sister went to Catholic school. We’re half-siblings with an indecisive father and mothers of different beliefs. She would ask her at fourteen and me at ten what Hinduism was, and I would cower because I knew the word but not the meaning. She wore cross earrings and spoke sacrilege in the quiet of our room. She had a communion before she began high school, whereas I’d only ever had a baptism. During the ceremony, I sat on a pew surrounded by family, wearing a floral black dress, and spent the whole of the event trying to understand what was going on.
Every now and then, I feel a sudden tug pull me towards the end of my block, and from the cracked pavement stairs, I’ll glance through the stained-glass windows, hear the choir sing, and imagine the gentle scent of a blown-out flame. Some deep and buried place within me craves a religious life, but I shoo away those incessant, subconscious pleas to go into the church. Still, I imagine. I would wear my Sunday best. I would tip my head before I sat in the pew. I would drink the wine and eat the bread even though I’m not allowed. I would close the curtain in that little box and confess, confess, confess.
What if all I’m dealing with is a fear of missing out? Maybe I want god in the same way I want to attend the party everyone talks about, and relate to the songs on the radio about heartbreak, and wear that new, popular item of clothing sported by those I pass on the street. Maybe I have it right and discovered the purpose of religion (Maybe I’m young and naive and too foolish to contemplate such things).
I have never been a religious person, but I always longed for that gentle cure, that failsafe, that salve of all that is holy and good—the antidote of faith to end the plague of questions. I wanted to feel protected by some all-powerful being, I wanted to have a fate, I wanted to end up somewhere perfect, I wanted answers. I wanted to feel connected, like the choir singers who sway as one, the uniformity of bowed heads and knees rested on those little cushioned benches behind each pew. My grandma is close with the people in her church. She feels better when she goes. She wears a cross around her neck and gets ash and holy water rubbed on her forehead. For a lot of people, religion is light, it is soft and warm—this is what I sought. I never believed in god, but a part of me wanted to.
Recently, I’ve been reading a lot about god. Many gods, all of them, or all of the ones I know about. I read the works of cult leaders, pessimists, and priests. Nietzsche wrote about god being dead.
Should I capitalise god? As an atheist, would it be wrong if I did? Would you care more about what I’m saying if I offered you that morsel of respect? Who wins in this scenario? Is it god himself?
Nietzsche wrote about God being dead. He came up with characters and a plotline full of humour and tragedy and I thought about the gods of Homer and Hesiod. I wondered if the religious writings leftover today were created by people trying to make sense of their world by crafting their own forms of guidance. How do you tell the difference? Was Zarathustra real and Jesus but a myth? Could I walk up to someone and ask them why they believe, and could I get them to try and convince me? Would it be like a vegan asking why a vegetarian eats cheese? Is it just personal preference at the end of the day?
Maybe God died and only exists in the old, the has-been, in memories. Maybe it’s leftover scraps of God that bang on the sky and cause thunder to erupt and clatter down to us. Maybe science is wrong, and the world began with Adam and Eve and that forbidden thing. Maybe if I bite the right fruit, I’ll learn the truth.
I walk down the street, and a man yells, “GOD IS DEAD!”
He yells, “GOD IS DEAD!” And I bow to the priest at the bottom of the steps.
Kaelis Albota Pappert is a first-year student at Carleton working on a degree in English and a minor in Philosophy. Growing up in Ottawa meant Kaelis had access to countless libraries and supportive teachers, all of which helped to cultivate a love for the English language. Her non-fiction essay “I am Writing About God for Some Reason: Ramblings of an Atheist in Crisis” centres around her difficult relationship with organized religion. This is the first literary work Kaelis has submitted for publication.
