I lost my faith, but it’s okay

I think I’ve lost my faith.  There–I said it. I’ve lost faith itself–meaning, the ability to trust and hope in the unseen.  And I’ve lost my faith–my experience and participation in Protestant Christianity. 

And I think it’s okay.

I became a Christian when I was 12 or 13 years old.  I’m 34, nearly 35 now.  And for the past twenty years, my faith has been intertwined with many other parts of me: my family, my friend circle, my education, and my profession.  That’s not unusual.  In fact, in the Church we would say that a faith fully integrated in one’s life is a sign of growth and Christian maturity.  But what happens when all of those other parts disappear or change rapidly?  

In the spring of 2019 my husband accepted a promotion that required us to move.  This was his third move, my second, and it was across the state.  I was pregnant with our second child and working part-time for a church I loved.  (In fact, it was the same church where we had met!)  But I wasn’t just a part-time staff member.  I had four years of undergrad from a Christian college, three years of seminary training, eleven years of professional ministry, and two ordination services to put the “Reverend” in front of my name.  I was working part-time because it was the best option for our family (since we had a two year old at home) and the church’s budget.  The plan was always to return to full-time ministry soon enough.

But this was an incredible opportunity for my husband and as much as I cried, we couldn’t say no.  I cried as I read my resignation to the Leadership Board.  I cried as we looked at house listings online.  I cried as we shared the news with friends.  (The pregnancy hormones might have influenced this a bit.)  And on July 11, we moved into our new house.  We spent the morning unpacking and then my phone rang.  My dad had been taken to the ER back home, unresponsive.  We found out later his sugar had dipped dangerously low and he was barely breathing.  He slipped into a diabetic coma and died exactly a week later.  It was traumatic to say the least.  My dad’s divorce from his second wife had just been finalized and it was my ex-stepmother who was still his medical power of attorney, and she was traveling out of state.  There were phone calls and decisions to be made and a near constant stream of messages from his high school buddies.  It would have been exhausting already, without being six months pregnant and three hours away.

Two weeks later, another phone call came.  “Grandma’s gone,” my mother choked out the words on the line.  The matriarch of our family had died suddenly in the middle of the night.  More decisions, more conversations, more trauma, another funeral.  How do you meet your new neighbors when you’re always exhausted and crying?

I visited a new church the weekend after my grandmother died.  I went by myself, as Justin and I agreed we weren’t ready to navigate a church nursery drop-off.  The music started and tears began to pour down my cheeks.  Why?  I asked God. Why bring me all this way and take so much from me?  And then why take so much more?  I had a tight-knit group of friends, I had a church full of people who knew and loved me, I had hundreds of colleagues with whom I shared experiences and accountability.  I had a title.  I had purpose and responsibilities.  I had cousins and stepfamily and aunts and uncles.  Our holidays were so crowded that we often spilled out onto the patio or we jokingly had “4:00 and 7:00 seatings” for Christmas dinner.  How could I have faith when it felt like with every step I took, the ground gave way?  

My grief felt all-consuming

Friends from back home sent flowers and cards in the beginning, but there isn’t really an etiquette for what to send when a friend is in despair for weeks.  I was grieving everything and I was furious at God. How do you make new friends when you’re resentful and angry?

Who was I without everything else that had helped to define me?  My understanding of my faith had always included myself having a role.  I taught, I served, I spoke, I preached, I wrote, I planned, I strategized, I led.  What was it like to be a person of faith without also being a leader within that faith?  Did the God I preached about really love me if I wasn’t fulfilling the “calling” I had worked so hard to understand?  Was God even relevant to me now?  Was I relevant to God?

I blamed the spiritual distance I was feeling on my missing Bible.  My Bible, full of notes and scribbles and jotted down prayers, had disappeared during the move.  I was sure I had seen it as we unpacked, and figured it was just tucked under a pile or mixed in with a box.  Even with a Bible app for my phone and eventually a newly purchased edition, it just wasn’t the same.  So I barely opened it.  I hardly prayed, save for a few “please please please”s and “thank you, thank you, thank you”s as Shauna Niequist (or maybe Anne Lamott?) writes.  We attended church a couple times a month, as best we could with a toddler and a newborn.  The church was different than any I had attended before, and the sermons sparked both of our imaginations and curiosity.  But I didn’t allow much to sink in deeply.  I was in survival mode and had been for months.

And then, March came.  And a global pandemic.  And school closures.  And work from home orders.  And my already-small world became even smaller.  Six months passed, marked only by the calendar and our baby’s growth. Survival mode became my default.

We watched church online twice a month.  I participated in an online book study with some women from the church.  Sometimes I felt the doubt mixed with grief bubble up, but most of the time, my faith felt absent.  Out of my desperation for connection to other women in a similar life stage, I volunteered to lead a mom’s group online for our church.  It was both familiar and strange to slip on my “leader” cap again.  As our first meeting ended, I closed in prayer.  I was surprised at how easily the prayer spilled from my mouth, how smoothly the requests and the words of blessings came.  I had a sensation of watching myself from outside my body, wondering, “Do I really believe all of this?”

The answer is, I don’t know.  

This past spring, like so many others, we planted our first vegetable garden. We didn’t expect much. We grew zucchini plants from seeds, and purchased grown tomato and strawberry plants to add to our plot. Nearly every day this summer my daughter would victoriously pluck a red (or sometimes green) strawberry or an orange sugar sweet tomato from the garden. As the calendar turned and the days shortened, our harvest lessened until it seemed we had a box full of weary leaves and stems.

As we began to winterize the yard, we examined the garden. Should we pull these up? Let them be? Some plants don’t die off when the cold temperatures approach.  Instead, they lay dormant.  Tomato plants are annuals and should generally be disposed of each fall. Strawberry plants, however, are perennials. They go dormant in the winter. My husband’s aunt encouraged us to bring them into the garage.  They don’t need water or sunlight, just let them be, she said.  You can bring them back out when it’s warmer. 

Dormant 

Have I lost my faith? Maybe. I know my current participation in the Christian faith is nothing like its ever been. Have I lost my ability to trust the unseen? To hope in the future? Maybe. Or maybe it is dormant. Maybe my faith can be dormant.  I’m not sure it’s growing or dying.  I’m not sure it’s doing much of anything really.  But I don’t think I’m meant to throw it all out. All I can do is wait out this winter and see what comes at the first sign of spring. I think it will be okay.

Post-script: After reading a draft of this essay, a friend said it reminded her of a part of the creation account in Genesis where the writer says, “The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” Formless…dark…chaotic…hopeless. And yet. The Spirit of God was there. It was as if the Spirit of God was okay in the midst of the dormancy of the earth. Do I believe that? I don’t know. But I think the Spirit of God doesn’t require belief as a prerequisite for presence. More to come. Perhaps.