Not Perfect

Sometimes it’s hard to be an atheist here. By here, I guess I mean in this country, but more specifically, I mean in my little town, or in my school I work in, or around my Facebook friends who are so Christian, or around my friends and family who are Christian. Aside from dealing with the idea that atheists are “bad” or “untrustworthy”, it’s more of my conflict that stems from being a people pleaser, knowing I am disappointing people. Some of my friends just think that everyone should be Christian, and some really fear for my soul and mourn the fact that I will be spending eternity in hell. I really hate to disappoint people.

I love the lines in Tim Minchin’s Not Perfect, “This is my brain, and I live in it. It’s made of love and bad song lyrics. It’s tucked away behind my eyes where all my fucked up thoughts can hide, cause god forbid I hurt somebody.” I often have to remind myself to not try to take responsibility for other people’s feelings. My job is to be genuine and to be myself. If that makes someone sad, it’s really not something I should worry about.

I do sometimes worry about it though, especially when I care about the people very much, like a couple of my closest friends or family members. My Grandma has Alzheimer’s and she lives with me and I take care of her. She’s a lifelong Catholic and I think it would break her heart to know I’m not even Christian. Luckily, it’s easy to hide my non-belief from her, and if she hears me say something blasphemous, it’s quickly forgotten.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about the nature of “belief” lately, and how that relates to my loved ones. Some people say that belief in anything supernatural is delusional, and therefore akin to mental illness. Tim has said as much, in saying he didn’t Christen his children because he doesn’t want the mentally ill handling them, but this could have been purely a joke (or not), I don’t know. I can’t really accept that religious beliefs are a symptom of mental illness though, when I think, again, of those I love.

I had dinner this week with a high school friend I hadn’t seen in many years and his partner. They are Methodist ministers and are gay. They are lovely, god-believing men who are trying to make a difference within their religion regarding how the church treats homosexuals. I think that is admirable. They didn’t seem to care that my beliefs about god were different than theirs. They just wanted to reconnect with me and learn the joys and sorrows of my life, and I felt the same toward them. There’s no way I could view them as mentally deficient in any way. And at night, when I hear my grandma, in the room next to me, talking out loud to her god, starting with “our Father who art in heaven”, and five minutes later ending with “and please bless Mary Sue and thank you for allowing her to take care of me, day and night”, I feel like I would be the mentally ill one if I thought less of her for her devotion.

Maybe, someday, if I get to talk to Tim Minchin again, instead of being a starstruck fangirl, I’ll actually ask him something of importance, like if has people in his life who are religious. People he loves? People he respects? Can he genuinely care for them while disagreeing with them?

I’m glad that in our church we have such a wide variety of belief systems and we are all respected and treated with worth and dignity. I LOVE the words in our hymn, Here We Have Gathered, "May all who seek here find a kindly word. May all who speak here feel they have been heard." I love coming to this place where I am loved and accepted for who I am, and where I love and respect people who I may disagree with. I try to carry that out of the church doors into the rest of my life as well.

If I added a verse to “Not Perfect”, it would be about “My Church”. Lyrics below.



This is my church, and I live in it.
It’s made of stained glass, and people of different faiths.
The weird thing is we don’t see eye to eye,
But we see heart to heart and that is why
We support each others’ search for meaning.
This is my church, and it’s fine.
It’s where I spend the vast majority of my time.
It’s not perfect, but it’s mine.