Read Online Uncross My Heart by Austin, Andrews & Austin - Free Book Online Page A

curious newcomer to the church, seeing the pillow being carried down the aisle, asked about its religious significance. The priest snorted in disdain. ‘It’s for the cat.’”
    The students laughed.
    “Over time, we forget the context, and perhaps even worse, we attack those who question. The best sign I’ve ever seen in a church read, ‘God asks that you give up your soul, not your brain.’
    “Remember Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John did not write as individuals. Communities selected a prominent person’s name as author of their collective works, created to guide their own people.
    Their writings are important and sociologically relevant, but are they the Word of God, or are they the words of a people who believed in their God and wanted to improve the lives of their community? And either way, does it matter?”
    I saw a few students flinch at the idea that anything in the Bible might not matter.
    “If we could magically write down every word our parents ever said to us, we would find amazing truths, conflicting information, and downright lies. ‘Santa Claus comes down the chimney and leaves you gifts if you’re good. Santa Claus is actually your father. You need to get a college education so you can support yourself. Marry rich. It’s important to love everyone. We have to kill people when we’re at war. Life is hard. Life is good.’ Regardless of the conglomeration of information, we have a sense that our parents did their best to communicate what they believed to be true in order to help us. The Bible parents us. We will continue to analyze passages in the Bible for context.”
    Class had run long and Gladys Irons was standing in the back of the room. I wondered why. Students nervously rustled their papers and books, not wanting to be in class a minute longer than they’d signed up for.
    Roger Thurgood III stood and nearly shouted to be heard. “Do you believe anything that Christ said?” His voice quivered in demonstration of his frustration with my thoughts.
    “I believe, Roger, along with many other scholars, that only a handful of statements in the New Testament can be authenticated as the words of Christ. And of those, almost all are about love, none about hate or fear or warnings of dire things to come. We’re out of time. See you next week.” The class rose as a group and exited the room, Roger mercifully among them.
    Gladys walked to the front of the room as I erased the whiteboard.
    “Are you available this afternoon to meet with Christ Victorious , a publication trying to make sure the right person gets in the White House?”
    “Right person as in right wing?”
    “This is your chance. They need fresh blood—”
    I turned too suddenly and faced her, wanting this uptight woman to simply leave me alone. “Gladys, I’m not like you.”
    “Oh, Alexandra, we’re past that now. It’s my fault. I didn’t appreciate what you bring to the Christian movement because of your odd presentation style, but that’s exactly why you’re able—”
    “Gladys, I’m a liberal theologian. Ninety percent of the things you condemn, I don’t.”
    “I think we’re rather in line with one anoth—”
    “For starters, I don’t believe God punishes unbaptized babies, adulterers, or gay people.”
    “Well, they don’t go to heaven.”
    “I think we make our own heaven and hell for the most part, Gladys.”
    “Oh, there’s a hell as surely as you are standing here before me.
    And I believe that murderers and rapists and hideous people who do not follow God’s law most certainly go into the eternal fire.”
    “Or perhaps those people are already in an eternal fire, and when they die, the agony and pain felt by the person they raped or killed, and the agony and pain of every single human who suffered due to that person’s torture and death, are made a part of the soul of that murderer like a suit sewn to the skin that cannot be removed. And that oppressive hopelessness and pain is their ongoing hell