Tastes Awful

“In Catholic school as vicious as Roman rule

I got my knuckles bruised by a lady in black

And I held my tongue as she told me

‘Son fear is the heart of love’

So I never went back”

Lyrics from I’ll Follow You Into the Dark

by Death Cab for Cutie

I bought a bed the other week from a mattress store down town (a first for me, it’s a part of living in the real world, buying your own bed). The salesman, not much older than me, was a personable guy and seemed to be interested in my doings in Chicago, as a salesman should be. Soon enough he found out that I was a seminary student interested in church planting and preaching.

Often, this intensifies the difficulty of striking a genuine conversation about spiritual things as a certain agenda is projected upon the preacher or seminarian. But that isn’t entirely how it went.

He thought I was studying to be a priest at first – the word “seminary” provokes that reaction occasionally. But as I clarified what Trinity Seminary is and that I was about he proceeded to let me in on some of his story. In it, he mentioned going to Catholic School where he was basically force fed what seemed to be a twisted version of selective biblical truth, and “railed into” (I think his words were..) by nuns.

Steve, like many others had a taste of religion and the bitter taste is still strong in his mouth. There is an inoculation of indifference to the Gospel that goes along with this bitter taste, one which many of us are far too familiar with.

This taste that Steve has lingering, and perhaps that Benjamin is referring to in his lyrics, is not a reflection of the true Gospel as far as I’m concerned. But how can we best talk to someone like him and show what the Gospel really is when this image of Christianity is already set? Maybe you’ve had similar conversations or a similar experience as Steve. Do share…