El Burrito
"So I was curious about this, did your views change while you were in India? About what you think about God?"
It was a very legitimate question so far.
"You know, getting out there in the world, getting exposed to different kinds of thinking, I thought, Sarah might change her mind about some of those things..."
The table got quiet instantly and I could feel them looking at me and I looked at my plate. Looked at my chimichanga, the little bits of pulled chicken and tomato under my fork. I heard her voice, but I knew what she was saying. Her transparency beamed across the table at me, at all of us. Her condescension embarassed us, embarassed me, because she seemed to feel that she was stating the obvious. You know, the mistaken, backward, southern God you thought you knew about, those quaint ideas you had, the ones you thought were real because you grew up in church and were homeschooled and didn't know any better, that MUST be different now that you've met, like, Hindus. I was surprised that she was so openly patronizing after all the conversations we had had about theology back in the day. She had never really been on the same page with me but had also never been critical.
Had my views changed at all? Well yeah. I don't know how they couldn't, and I wouldn't have wanted them to stay the same. It's not developing, growing if it stays the same, and living in India had changed a lot of things ... how could my view of God not be affected? But I don't mean undermined. Just different. Bigger in some ways, but a person can only retain so much.
I needed to say something in reply. I couldn't say yes those views HAD changed, because she would take it as a recantation of what I believed, which I didn't mean at all. It would be saying, yes, my beliefs were so silly. Silly me! But I didn't want to give the impression that I was threatened by my worldly experience, that I was clinging to old beliefs in spite of what I had seen and learned, so I couldn't really say no either. I wanted to kick her for asking me that.
"I think... every experience changes you to a certain degree, or you'd never learn anything. It's not that I changed my, what I believe, I think I learned a lot more about who God is."
The table relaxed and she seemed satisfied with my answer. I felt like I had said what I meant. Things went better after that.
It was a very legitimate question so far.
"You know, getting out there in the world, getting exposed to different kinds of thinking, I thought, Sarah might change her mind about some of those things..."
The table got quiet instantly and I could feel them looking at me and I looked at my plate. Looked at my chimichanga, the little bits of pulled chicken and tomato under my fork. I heard her voice, but I knew what she was saying. Her transparency beamed across the table at me, at all of us. Her condescension embarassed us, embarassed me, because she seemed to feel that she was stating the obvious. You know, the mistaken, backward, southern God you thought you knew about, those quaint ideas you had, the ones you thought were real because you grew up in church and were homeschooled and didn't know any better, that MUST be different now that you've met, like, Hindus. I was surprised that she was so openly patronizing after all the conversations we had had about theology back in the day. She had never really been on the same page with me but had also never been critical.
Had my views changed at all? Well yeah. I don't know how they couldn't, and I wouldn't have wanted them to stay the same. It's not developing, growing if it stays the same, and living in India had changed a lot of things ... how could my view of God not be affected? But I don't mean undermined. Just different. Bigger in some ways, but a person can only retain so much.
I needed to say something in reply. I couldn't say yes those views HAD changed, because she would take it as a recantation of what I believed, which I didn't mean at all. It would be saying, yes, my beliefs were so silly. Silly me! But I didn't want to give the impression that I was threatened by my worldly experience, that I was clinging to old beliefs in spite of what I had seen and learned, so I couldn't really say no either. I wanted to kick her for asking me that.
"I think... every experience changes you to a certain degree, or you'd never learn anything. It's not that I changed my, what I believe, I think I learned a lot more about who God is."
The table relaxed and she seemed satisfied with my answer. I felt like I had said what I meant. Things went better after that.
posted by sarah at 10:18 PM
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