Chapter Eight

We’re OK!

Many years ago I knew a prostitute (not in the Biblical sense) who kept a crucifix above her bed.  No matter how busy Saturday night might have been, Sunday morning would always find her at mass.  If she missed mass in the morning, she went that night before going back to work. 

I used to laugh at this apparent absurdity—sinnin’ on Saturday, forgiven on Sunday.  Then, years later, I began making my living by gathering up scrap metal I found lying by the sides of roads and in empty fields.  At first I only picked up metal lying in ditches along the roads and highways.  But, as metal became harder to find, I began gathering it from railroad tracks.  (When the railroad workers replaced track, they left the old track lying beside the new, or cast it off in the ditch.)  Track is very heavy, so I made a very good living by doing this.

Then I learned that taking old track was a federal offense and I could go to jail.  To my way of thinking the track was discarded and belonged to anyone who found it, in this case, me.  Regardless, I now knew it was wrong and that I could go to jail for taking this stuff.  But the money was just too good, so I kept it up until one day I was finally caught by railroad officials.  Their threats were enough to keep me off the railroads.  Well, at least that part of the track.  (They let me keep what I had in the truck, which surprised me.  They said, “Take whatcha got and get outta here!”  I took it and got.)

For a year or so I kept cleaning the Tidewater area of discarded scrap metal, but I was too good at what I was doing and, so, metal began getting harder and harder to find.  The harder it was to find, the less particular I got about where it came from, or who it belonged to.  I climbed over or under fences to get at metal.  This wasn’t railroad stuff and I was definitely stealing now, and I knew it.  But, again, the money was just too good. 

I got caught again.  This time I was in a large metal building that appeared to be both abandoned and falling apart.  I had my truck inside the building and my cutting torch in my hand when the owner drove in.  Boy, was he hot!  His face was a mottled mixture of both red and blue (I notice these things) as he yelled at me that he had already called the police.  Then he peeled out and was gone.  I left right behind him, turning left where he turned right.  For several days and nights afterwards I kept waiting for the police to come knocking on my door. 

They never did.

In the beginning I loved this scrap metal work.  It was like being on a great and glorious treasure hunt, for I never knew what I would find, where, or how much.  But, as metal became scarce, I became less concerned about ownership, I knew it was just a matter of time before I ended up in jail.  (I would probably have been the hardest working person in jail.  It was really hard labor.)

In the true manner of the KSC, like attracts like.  Sooo, one day I pulled into a McDonald’s for lunch.  While I was eating, somebody stole all my tools, including the back bone of my business, my cutting torch. 

Now it was my time to be a mottled mixture of red and blue.  Boy was I hot!

By evening, though, I had cooled down and I realized it was time to quit the business.  It was going to do nothing except put me in jail.

During this same period of time I was meditating and praying daily.  Not only that, I attended church every Sunday (religiously, you might say) and was the adult Sunday School teacher to boot.  (I would rather have died than have anyone at church learn what I was doing.)

Now that I’ve walked that particular path¾ churchin’ on Sunday, stealin’ on Monday¾I find it much easier to understand, accept and therefore not judge the prostitute.  Sure, she was living in darkness, as was I.  But, from her darkness she was reaching for the light.  As was I.

It’s so much easier to know when someone else is living wrong.  As you read this you probably wonder how I could have done such a thing, especially given the fact I prayed, meditated daily and went to church.  When we read about things like this, the answers are so obvious and apparent.  But, when we’re involved in the daily affairs of our own life, the answers are never so obvious.  That’s why all of us can give advice—even when our own lives are so screwed up.  She and I weren’t absurd.  And we were just wholly human and trying to survive.  We got sucked into the darkness one step at a time before we even realized what we were doing.  If she had thought her deeds were repulsive to God, she couldn’t have done them.  If I had thought that what I was doing was anything more than making a living (which is probably what she thought), I couldn’t have done it.  The fact is, we didn’t think about it at all.  We simply pushed it out of our minds, preferring not to deal with it.  I did have a recurring haunting vision of a newspaper headline that used to bother me, though:

“SUNDAY SCHOOL TEACHER JAILED!”

It was not a pleasant thought.

Anyone with a conscience has skeletons in their closets they hope no one else ever discovers.  It may not be stealing or prostitution, but something is always there.  I once read about a priest who listened to the confessions of nuns saying it “was like being stoned to death with popcorn.”  The wonderful thing about it is that it doesn’t matter to God what we’ve done.  When we reach up in sincere prayer, our pasts are not only forgiven, but they blotted out of His memory.  The only one it really matters to is us and to others we may have involved, such as husbands and wives.  Often, though, as with the nuns, we are our own harshest critic. 

There is one group, however, that judges us more harshly if we’re church going Christians…those who don’t go to church, but know the life we’re living.  They’re ones who say, “Christians are just a bunch of hypocrites.” 

Yeah, we are.  But we’re trying, but we often fail.         

Ultimately, what does matter is that we learn to overcome our indiscretions and learn to forgive ourselves.  With one exception, there is no crime so horrible it can’t be forgiven by God.  Even the crimes of Hitler.  This may not seem right or fair to you and I, but it does to God.  The important thing, though, is this: if the extremely evil can be forgiven when they are truly sorry, so can we.

About Hitler being forgiven?  He’d have to be sincere, and it wouldn’t be. 

Often what we carry around with us are little guilt trips.  “How could God love me the way I am and after what I’ve done?”  Little thoughts like these keep tripping us by stopping us from loving ourselves.  Because we make God in our image, what we think is what we think God thinks.

Well, tain’t so.  God has a mind of His own, which He is actually capable of using.  The mind of God is dominated by Love.  And, there is no one in the universe who knows you as intimately as He. 

Getting to know God better comes to us only by way of exercising our freewill, as we shall see.