Yes, Jesus Loves Me
It is another mild day in Southern California on Konya Drive, and I am hanging around the house, content to be without siblings or neighborhood kids for a change to distract me as I rock back and forth in a 60’s style rocking chair with green and brown plaid upholstery while thinking about Jesus. My parents have been bringing me to Sunday school at my request. We do not belong to a specific church, but I remember my dad telling me we are Protestants, so I ask if I can start going to Sunday school, and they are fine with that. My father drops me off at an A-frame wooden church, and I spend an hour with a middle-aged teacher and a handful of kids, learning about God and Jesus in a plain white cinder block basement with a few posters on the wall. Afterwards, my mom or dad pick me up and drive me home in silence. I come home with my head full of stories and songs about Jesus, who fascinates me. I am amazed that he is so powerful and yet seems so kind, a friend to children and animals alike. I love learning how to sing “Jesus loves me” in English and in Spanish, and since I don’t study Spanish anywhere else, I am impressed that I can sing this song very well.
Anyway, so there I am on this otherwise uneventful day, legs tucked up underneath me, rocking back and forth and thinking about what a sweet guy Jesus is. I am pondering the amazing thought that Jesus actually knows who I am when my father walks in the room. He is tall, wearing a short- sleeved, lightly striped business shirt and pants with a belt, his hair slightly messy and sticking up, and he looks distracted. I am not sure why he is standing there; he is apparently thinking about something but not seeing or talking to me. I wait for him to say something, but when he doesn’t, I decide to break the awkward silence and talk to him about Jesus. I can’t remember exactly what I say to him, but I jump in and go on and on about some of the stories I have been learning in Sunday school; however, I find it odd that he is not responding to any of my stories but just staring into space. I suddenly need to know, and I don’t know how else to phrase it other than to blurt out, “Dad? Do you believe in Jesus?” I am shocked that he doesn’t even have to think about it as he answers immediately in a no-nonsense tone, “No, uh-uh.” I reply, incredulous, “You don’t believe in him at all?” and he answers in a matter-of-fact voice, “I believe he was a man, I believe that he walked around the earth, but I don’t believe he was anyone special.” Without waiting for my response, he turns abruptly and leaves the room.
I am 8 years old. I don’t know how to process this moment, and as an adult, I look back on it as a moment of obtuseness on his part, an inability to connect or relate to his oldest daughter, and so I hide behind the rocking chair for the rest of the day, curled up in a ball so no one can see me, crying softly so no one could hear me, either. For some reason, I don’t want him to know that his straightforward answer makes me cry and has broken my heart, somehow. He can be a super-fun dad, but he also has a cold, distant side, too, and in my innocence, atheism is not a concept I can understand. I assumed he would answer, “Yes” to the question, and his answering “No” makes me feel embarrassed for him. Even at my young age, I know that it is not the right way to talk to a young child, let alone his daughter.
I felt very alone behind that chair, but life goes on. I can’t remember continuing going to Sunday school. . When we move to upstate New York, my parents become very involved in the local church, and my father completely changes. He gives two hundred dollars a month for his offering to our little Dutch Reformed Protestant Church, and he cries whenever he hears a song about the Virgin Mary. I know for a fact that he would not remember this story if I re-told it to him. But it affects how I think about my own children’s belief systems about God, which is whatever they choose to believe is right for them.
I never found a family church that we stayed with for any length of time, and I consider myself Buddhist. But if my children or grandchildren ask me if I believe in Jesus, I will simply answer, “Yes.” — June 11, 2011
