MY SPIRITUAL CONVERSION

                            WHERE"S CHARLIE

Organized religion has tended to leave me cold and uninspired. Forced attendance every Sunday for years at Temple did not exactly turn me on. From time to time I did enjoy hearing the often thoughtful sermons but I found the rest of the service generally tedious.

I hated responsive reading.

"And the Lord said ......."

"And the Lord said......."

"Honor thy Father and thy Mother"

"Honor thy Father and Mother"

and so on ............................

Then one day it was all over for me when in class the Rabbi who was teaching the class was talking about God creating all things I raised my hand and asked but who created God? 

A so called firned of mine leaped out of his chair made a bee-line for my throat and probably would have murdered me if the Rabbi hadn't come to my rescue. He also said something profound. "In the Jewish religion the contemplation of God is the highest form of prayer." 

If there had been more of that kind of communication going on I probably would have like my organized religion. But that was not the case....

Then when I was about 16 or so - as many curious kids do I decided to explore other relgions. One of our Catholic neighbors was more than happy to let me go to church with her and her children to attend my first Mass.

Well if I thought that Temple was boring - the Mass out did it. THe service seemed interminable. I also had the same reaction to the Catholic art work as I did the Jewish art work. I experienced too muchness - hard to describe - in all of it in its own way. I think I was hyper sensitive to the sense of exclusiveness about both groups.

After my forced confirmation I stopped attending Temple except for the so called High Holy Days which continued to be tedious.

I did look forward to the annual Xmas show put on in our predominantly Jewish populated High School. I particularly liked the Christmas songs sung by the choir, especially Oh Holy Night, and Something Silver Bells....

Xmas eve was always exciting as my brother and I looked forward to getting up at the crack of dawn to open the great presents we routinely got. Thank God our parent were liberal enough to let us celebrate the presents part of Christmas and not have to be forced to only celebrate Chanakuh.

That was the good news.

The bad news was that we were not allowed to have a Christmas tree. The rational for that one I could never quite understand. But divinity intervened in the form of the neighbors across the street - electricians - who always had a spectacular light show on their property and the most gorgeous decorated tree you could possibly imagine.

Good Christains that they were they always let my brother and I visit, decorate and luxuritate under the annual Christmas tree event.

So much for me and organized religion. Meanwhile on quite another level I was increasingly God obsessed. I wondered from an early age who I was really, where I had come from, what was my purpose, and where was I going to go when I died whatever death was. Or for that matter what ever life was.

At about 16 one day I, somehat depressed, was walking home from High School on Lincoln Road in Miami Beach and spotted a man holding a sign that said: "A FREE NEW TESTAMENT TO ANY JEW WHO PROMISES TO READ IT"

Instantly I felt energized. What is this all about I wondered. Although Jewish by birth I knew the gist of the New Testament. While not intimate with the finer details I was familiar with the birth, life, and teaching of Jesus the Christ. I also had a certain respect especially for the Book of John that had resonated with me.

I felt personally challenged.

So I stopped and asked the man who was carrying the sign to tell me what this was all about. He said his name was Charlie and that he was broadcasting the word of God to all who would want to know about it.

"Yes - but why just to Jews?"

And so we began a dialogue that started abstractly but evolved over time into something really special.

Charlie - a painfully thin man with noteworthy reserve, introduced me to the idea that the bible - all of it - but particularly the New Testament is the inspired word of God. "In the beginning was the word, and word was God......"

"But Charlie" - me feeling on the defensive I went on my smart kid know it all kick - this whole thing stands or falls on whether or not your first assumptions are accurate. And since the bible was written by men over the course of hundreds of years then how are you so certain that the words in it are the inspired words of God - whoever or whatever he, she, it is?

Initially we went around in circles. And as we did so while I liked the man - Charlie - I began to hate what he had to say. What made him so sure he is right never quite realizing that I was mrroring him in my own non reflective way.

I ended up taking one of the New Testament Bibles and I think I actually did read parts of it.

I continued to meet and speak with Charlie every so often quickly picking up where I had left off - usually competing with him as if I was on a debate team trying to score the most points. Throuout all my paries he remained unflabbable: "The New Testament is the inspired word of God."

But Charlie - what makes you so sure? You don't know that factually. No one knows that factually. You want to believe it, so be it. But that is just your opinion. It is not fact.."

"You have to take it on faith, Charlie would answer.

Yes, I would respond, but your faith is like faith healing. Not knowing the concept of projection I intuited that his faith was the equivalent to projecting his final authotity onto the mysterious notion of the trinity, and wafers, and inspired words of God, and the likes.

Despite my confrontations, Charlie always remained a gentleman - a truly gentle - man. He always smiled at me, would shake my hand, and wish me well when we parted.

When I was 18 I went off to Columbia College in New York. I majored in philosophy and really got deeply into the core questions that I had always been interested in sense those early years going to Temple.

My capacity to be logical increased. So that when I would come back to Miami Beach on vacations often, running  into Charlie always at the same place  with the same sign offering to give away a free New Testament to any Jew who promised to read it, I instantly used the opportunities to press my biased points on him.

If the truth be known I wanted him to capitulate - indicate that I had as much a bead on the truth as he did. Or something like that.

And as usual - Charlie ramained stable, solid, predictable, and consistent. I began noting my basic attitude to him changing as the years started to add up. When meeting him I found it less urgent to start up the now familiar - indeed boring - debate - Without quite knowing it as it was happening - it was more important to just be in the presence of an extraordinarily decent human being.

These feelings didn't happen in a straight up manner from competition to sharing.... just enjoying being with.... I would alternate feeling pleasure to be in his aura to cursing him out as thinking he - and people like him - are so sure they know the nature of reality and dedicated to shoving it down people's throats like mine  and so forth.

Suddenly it was twenty or so years later.   Where did the time go?  I rarely came back to Miami Beach but when I did I would inevitably run into Charlie - generally the same place but a within a few blocks from his usual position.

On one occassion I noticed that Charlie had put on some weight - filled out - and actually transformed his appearance from his scarecrow persona to a really good looking man. And this time - surprise of surprises - Charlie told me that he had gotten married since we last spike and he was now the father of a little girl - 3 years old.

I was shocked - in a good way. Imagine Charlie getting married and being a father. I never would have believed it. Indeed I had just finished getting unmarried in a wrenching divorce. I never would ever have believed that was in the cards for me either.

A few days later I actually saw Charlie on a bike with his daughter sitting on the back both of them smiling and apparently having a great old time.

That was the last time I saw Charlie in the flesh.

A few years later when I came back to Miami Beach for a rare visit I happened to read a story in The Maimi Daily News that Charlie - my Charlie - and his daughter had been in an accident in which his daughter was  thrown off the back of his bike and died.

The words I read were like daggers stabbing me. Not Charlie - this is truly a tragedy.

It didn't occur to me to try and find Charlies' number and call him to express how truly sorry I was for him.

And indeed until I thought about writing this article have I thought about the meaning of my relationship of many years with Charlie. But when I look at it from the perspective of the passage of many many years I feel something exquisitely special when I think about him, his sign, his abiding faith, his unusual decency, the quality of our episodic intimacy, the trans valuation of values as to what I think is truly meaningful and more that is hard to convey in words, I know that the whole thing taken as a whole comes as close to what I believe is as much of an organic experience of spirituality in the midst of this mystery called life as has been any other experience I have had.

I still have my doubts about the content of the Bible as the divinely inspired words of God. Maybe it is, may it isn't. Frankly Scarlett: I don't give a damn." What I do give a damn about is that in my experience it is rare to have and to sustain a meaningful connection through thick and thin that is real, intimate, and authentic.

So this is my experience of spirituality - grounded, of this earth - no need to rely on anything which appears to be transcendent and unearthy. What I know for certain derived from the crucible of my direct experience is that my relationship with Charlie and the permutations it has taken over the years is as rich, deep, and meaningful as any I have ever had in my life. 

Comments

[Seeker]

Your story reminds me of the fascinating story about Alphonse Ratisbonne. Full of coincidences!
Please do a web search and check it out!