A CONSCIOUS CONTACT WITH IRONY

A CONSCIOUS CONTACT WITH IRONY

Where has the appreciation of irony gone? In the rooms of AA perhaps they never were there. Sometimes I think, when people get sober, they start to take themselves so seriously that subtlety and delicate reference tend to be techniques that are akin to so much haute cuisine, not enough salt to taste the food.

So it was with a discussion about prayer and meditation and its value in one's daily affairs as the eleventh step promotes; "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out."

It was my turn to read my paragraph and it fell to me to read the St. Francis prayer, a lovely petitioning for people to act selflessly on behalf of their fellows, abjuring personal gains and needs in favor of those of others in their needs. As I said, a wonderfully selfless and poetic prayer.

I had difficulty in admitting to my adherence to daily prayer and meditation even as I regularly practice much daily contemplation and self examination. But the people sharing were admitting that as they aged in the program they were growing nearer to "a conscious contact with God" even as I was remaining at arm's length or greater to this concept of a God as I understand him.

And I explained that much of my resistance was formed during my youth when my rabbi announced in front of my Hebrew class that, after determining that my father worked on the Sabbath, that god would grant him special dispensation because he was a doctor; and that was when my religious belief tanked. And any relationship that I may have had with god was immediately terminated by the preposterous notion set forth by the rabbi that a god could possibly care or in fact give him specific dispensation because of his profession and that a rabbi in fact would have entree into that mysterious knowledge was outrageous to me.

Even at that young age this seemed ridiculous.

But all that I did mention at the meeting was that the rabbi thought it within his purview to let me know how blessed my father was to be in the line of work that he was and he was conveying that message to me.

And in telling that story I was expressing the irony of how I had trouble believing in god, leaving plenty of room for many other reasons big and small why I might have doubts as to the existence of a higher being. But it was all with good humor... I thought.

But after the meeting a woman came up to me and quite seriously said to me "I want to assure you that Jesus was a Jew and he worked on the Sabbath. Did you know that?" And I said that I did and scurried away sensing that this could be a very bad lead in to a non ending and wrong minded discussion (at least from my point of view).

"You did? Oh. Good."

And I quickly turned on my heel and left the woman in my wake hoping that she would not follow me.

In an organization that professes to be non sectarian and non religious I was surprised to see someone so struck dumb by the notion of god, yet here she was and I am sure that she wasn't the only one in that room. The fact that we do not allow religious discussion in the rooms does not prevent accostings like this one outside the rooms from happening and this was the second time that this woman did this to me.

Without sounding like I am generalizing, even though I am, I find that people who are stricken with 'Godism' whether by religious proclivity or by deism through a real belief in the "fact" of the existence of god, there is, at least in my experience, a tendency to proselytize their beliefs to the "non-believer"; even if the non believer is trying very hard to attain the level of faith and spirituality that they proclaim to evince.

I chalk it up to a general lack of a sense of humor. For I do not see these people smile. They are so tied up with being enraptured that they do not have time for a good belly laugh.

That's why I will never find their god. Their reasoning will always be beyond my understanding. I will find my own road to spirituality but I doubt that this woman and those of her ilk will be able to recognize it.

© res 2/5/2012