A Cracker Gal Finds Religion

About the Book

If you are interested in religion, or in enriching your own religion, or in searching for a religion that suits you, you will enjoy this book. It is the story of the author’s religious journey in stories, poems and sermons. Early in life, her father took her brother, the oldest sibling, to one church, and she and her two older sisters went with their mother to another church. But, she recalls that her first significant religious experience happened at home when she was alone. The author’s spiritual growth began in this religiously divided family. She found her way, slowly and questioning, to a different religion and to her own theology. The fruits of her journey are, basically, what the book is about – poems and sermons. The poems chronicle the changes that occur in her life through this questioning: the meaning of life, relationships, love, nature, the seasons, and holidays. Writing and delivering sermons involve the head and the heart, knowledge and intuition, sensitivity and frankness. These sermons demonstrate the author’s commitment to a religion that fits her science, not a separation between the two. The sermons are about how to live in this world with all of its complexities, while understanding that not only do religions differ widely, but so do individual theologies, convictions, and personalities. The goal of the sermons is to help us all make this world a better place to live by respecting the worth and dignity of every person with justice, equity, and compassion; engaging in an ongoing search for truth and meaning; exercising our conscience and the democratic process; and acknowledging the interdependent web of all existence.

About the Author

I found my heaven the other day quite unexpectedly. I was just out on an afternoon’s walk for exercise and autumn beauty, Breathing the full breath of life – and wasn’t that heaven enough? As the path curved ‘round the hill, I stopped to take a more leisured view. Low and behold, I found myself on the edge Of the most beautiful field of goldenrod as far as I could see, Goldenrod in such abundance I had to walk among it. The path wound through the field, first this way, then that, down the slope Till I was side by side with goldenrod taller than I was. I’d never seen it grow like this! I almost wanted to become the goldenrod itself As I would embrace the blooms that waved to me. Ah, there are the bees, the wasps, the butterflies and other winged visitors That share in my delight, only it’s food they seek. I used my camera so I could remember long after I left. Memories are sweet, but experiencing is better. Spirituality is a human characteristic of meaning seeking. It is an intuitive experience of making sense of the data that are ever present in life; of paying attention in a different way; of making connections with ideas, with feelings, with people; of making life more beautiful and pain more bearable; of feeling great peace and joy; of extending life to be more than a physical existence. Love, empathy, compassion, and justice follow each other in natural sequence. Love is acceptance; empathy is to love and understand how people feel when they are in pain; compassion is having empathy with a desire to do something about it; and when we do something, we create a system of justice, of fairness, where all can have the experience of being accepted with equal dignity and integrity. We do not exist separate from other life; we are not divided between good and evil; between masculine and feminine; between spirit and nature; between reason and emotion. We are all of these, and the religious trek in my life is an attempt to synthesize and bring into wholeness. I have moved from the necessity for my religion to fit my science to the realization that my religion is more than my science. To see a beautiful sunset is more than the eyes' changing radiant energy of certain wavelengths and frequency to electro-chemical impulses that travel to the brain. Our sensation of the colors and patterns can be explained physiologically to a certain extent, but not the enjoyment of it. Listening to a concert means more to us than the combination of sound waves of various lengths that travel to the ears and are changed to electro-chemical impulses that travel to the brain. Dancing means more than the sensations that our bodies are moving in certain directions, in time or not in time, to the music’s beat. Life and death are more than we perceive and I believe that my attempt to live fully and understand is what religion is all about. I do this in the company of friends in a larger world filled with oppression and death as well as the promise of better things. The epic of evolution is a grand narrative that pertains to everyone, everywhere in the world. It is the story of creation drawn from the worldwide, self-correcting enterprise of scientific discovery. Even the heavens are not immortal. Previous generations of stars that lived and explosively died before our sun was born created all the complex atoms that now reside in and around us. The vast cosmos is creatively evolving. There is no creation story anywhere in the world that can exceed the wonder of an epic tale that teaches that we, in truth, are made of stardust. Sex is good. Sex is evil. Sex is a private matter. Sex is sinful. Sex is natural. Sex is beautiful. Sex is not pretty at all. Sex should be saved until marriage. Sex is only to be engaged in by a male and a female heterosexual. Sex is God’s gift for the procreation of children. Sex is God’s gift to be experienced in a mutual, respectful, and responsible manner. Many of us have our humorous moments about sex to recount. My favorite is a time in my young married life when my husband and I were enjoying a meal with another couple at their home. For some reason that I do not remember, the subject of sex arose. The husband of the other couple said, “There’s no such thing as good sex or bad sex. All sex is good.” The wife replied quickly, “Oh, I have had sex when it was lousy,” followed immediately by, “But not with you dear.” We all decided it was time to change the subject. Sex is often a subject of jokes. Many of the things we joke about are taboos for polite conversation. That’s one of the reasons we make jokes about them. What is more sensitive or personal than sex, religion or politics? If they are personal, then they are of significance and worthy of our serious consideration. Truth seeking, meaning in life, personal fulfillment, morality, social responsibility, and justice – these are what religion is about. And so religion is tied with sex and politics, and these are public as well as private matters.