Agnostics

       George is my enlightener. He reads Bishop Spong – the most controversial agnostic of our time - and brings me his articles printed out from the Internet. George’s questions remind me of my father. George also reminds me of my father’s practicality and tenderness: he is loving, protective, and never steps away from his line. 
       “I have two theological questions for you. How do people know about virgin birth? Did they see it? Then, the second question. How do people believe in Resurrection? Did they see it?” 
       Every time I preach too literally for George’s taste, he looks disappointed. “This is all propaganda! I understand, you have to say what you have to say.” 

       “George, you should know how much I try to stay away from propaganda! Don’t forget, I grew up in the Soviet Union. I watch very carefully that I do not become like Soviet ideologists, who ‘preached’ Lenin for decades and then, overnight, started praising Perestroika and cursing Communism. I can’t speak of things I do not believe in. I do not believe in manipulation.” 
       I can see that I hurt his feelings. I know I could be softer, but if I do not believe in what I preach, I should look for another career. Luckily, George forgives. 
       Ray Money invited me to lunch. I stopped at his house, where his wife used to nap right in the living room. I think of his wife, Eddie, sitting on the sofa, where she used to nap through our visits. Just across from her, on another sofa, I see a pillow with the statement, “Those who believe, will see miracles.” 
       Eddie is ninety-two and suffers from Alzheimer’s. She doesn’t hear and can’t see. “Does she stare at the pillow all the time when she is not asleep?” I wonder. Gradually, the disease robbed her body and mind of everything she liked to do. All she does now is sleep. She also falls a lot, and every fall takes her strength and confidence away. It also puts pressure on Ray, who now has to cook, watch over his wife, and also take care of himself. His neuropathy is not deadly, but is not pleasant, either. He struggles with the decision of placing Eddie into a nursing home, and the struggle on his face is obvious.     
       Now, when Ray’s wife is finally under the 24-hour care, he looks much more relaxed and is able to talk about theology. 
       “I do not understand what kind of God is this, if Eddie believed in Him more than I do. She prayed for a miracle to not lose her hearing since she was 37. Nothing helped. She had surgeries, hearing aids, but she has been nearly deaf for the last twenty years, and now Alzheimer’s… I am practical and pragmatic, and now I am destined to wrestle with questions like these until I die. There are no answers…” 
       I looked at the pillow and could see the point really well. What kind of God is that, if Ray was missing his wife’s companionship for many years? He was destined to be lonely, while she was still alive, right there, on the sofa. 
       “I found her Bible that I’ve never seen. It seems like she spent lots of time reading it. The Bible is full of her marks. What is interesting, she didn’t use a marker but a pencil. She underlined Bible verses and sentences very gently. I tried to understand the pattern of her thoughts, but there is no pattern…”  
       “Maybe this is God’s way to help you reconnect with Eddie now, when she can’t even speak?” Ray gave me a tired look. We both knew it was lame. 
       “What did she think about reading this Bible?” 
       “You know, Ray, preachers will jump at your story as at something they could use in their sermons, sorry.”
       “I am too pragmatic for that. My theology was never as strong as my talk. Why do I have all those questions that I am sure I will never get answers to…” 
       Ray puts a new portion of his lunch into his mouth and thinks for a while. “What I do not understand is why I never knew she had another Bible – different from the one she read in bed every night.” Ray’s face expresses hurt, “I guess, I will never know.”      
       Between George and Ray, I feel stretched. My faith is challenged. I do not have enough arguments to debate on the subject of Christ as our Savior. I have questions of my own when I hear conservative Christians claiming their salvation. They made me feel like a chopped liver. I am about to throw up when I see someone too religious throwing their salvation under the cat’s tail, but believing they are still better than us, regular mortals. When I am with George or Ray, I listen. With them, I am not behind the pulpit, so I keep my mouth shut. Both men have questions the size of the universe. Their eternity is at stake, and mine is too.   
       How can I find a solid enough reason for George’s question about his second daughter’s death, when she was just a baby? Where was God, when George’s oldest daughter, Pam, disappeared in the Mormon sect? Is she even alive after thirty years of silence? Who made Pam’s heart so hardened that she didn’t write even a letter to her grief-stricken parents? God? Satan? Mormons? George lives in rage and frustration for decades, and I always wonder how he can be still so loving and forgiving. He is 83 now, waiting for the miracle his whole life and trying, at the same time, to be an encourager for his wife, Dolores. To be on alert for thirty years every time when the phone or the doorbell rang, would be impossible for me. 
       Ray lives with questions that do not have answers… and he just turned ninety. His valid doubt is about will it be ever given to him. He has the sharpest mind and he needs companionship. He wants to talk to someone, he reads, and has guts to have his own opinion that he wants to share, but Alzheimer swallowed Ray’s wife’s intellect and memory. Who can he talk to?! 
       I, suddenly, understand what brings me so close to those two such different men: questions, rage, and frustration. I am robbed… I lost my country thirteen years ago, and I still do not know why. God left me in a foreign land, with two children and no money. My daughter suffered with anorexia, and my son was losing his hearing. We all wanted to go to Russia, but if we got on the plane, my son would leave the plane deaf. His eardrums, the doctor said, would not handle the high altitude. Here I am, a useless mother, not capable of providing for them. I was more present for my kids when I was thousands of miles away than when I was with them in the same house. 
       Depression made me blind and deaf to my own children’s faces and stories. The rage took over my mind. Where was God when I prostrated myself on the floor, weeping and fighting those scary debilitating and poisoning questions, expecting to be stricken by God for my rebelliousness. Maybe, the miracle was that I was not stricken right there, on the floor of my sister’s new house that gave roof to me and my children? 
      Maybe the miracle was my new brother-in-law, John Gibson, who married my sister and adopted us all? Maybe the miracle is in keeping us all alive? Then why, when my father finally came to America, he was not given too much time and died from cancer? Maybe the miracle was that he didn’t have to die alone in Russia without us. 
       God made me meet two agnostics to wrestle with the sweet innocent pillow statement “Those, who believe, will see miracles…”  I guess, the miracle is in becoming a pastor for those women and men, who help me wrestle with my questions and anger to finally heal myself first and, hopefully, help them heal, too.

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