Conversion Story Part 1: From Lutheran to Nothing

Posted on | August 20, 2008
by | Kim, Obl.O.S.B

This is going to be in a lot of parts, I think. And as always, I don’t want to tar everyone with the same brush. This is my experience and I don’t want it to be the defining “this is how ALL Lutherans are” or “every atheist is like this”, you know what I mean?

I was born and raised a Missouri Synod Lutheran in a nominally religious household. My mom was more religious than my dad, but not too religious. I grew up in the “we go to church on Sundays, Easter, and Christmas” mentality, and that was it. Christianity stopped when we left the church building. We didn’t do any kind of family prayer, no prayer before meals, nothing. We had some random Bibles around the house but it wasn’t a focus to read them.

When I was in the pre-school age, my mom, brother, and I attended a church that was apart of the Reformed Church of America. I really enjoyed my time there, as a 4 year old and I remember a lot of the Sunday School song still. There I was given the basics of Christianity – who Jesus was, what Heaven was, and what Jesus did for us. My brother, four years older than me; would often try to explain deeper theological concepts to me – such as what Original Sin was (“well, when we’re born we hurt our moms and that’s what sin is, when we hurt people. So we hurt our moms when we were born and that was our first sin.”) and what happened when people died (“when the body is buried the soul comes out of the ground and makes sure no one’s looking and goes SHOOP – up to Heaven”). Our older sister died when she was six and a half, so we did talk a lot about Heaven and angels and death in the household. Nothing too heavy, just that we would die at some point and we would go to Heaven and become angels.

I received a good formation from the RCA – I took very literally what they said. Jesus was always with us – well, I would make a spot in my bed at night for Jesus, so He would have a place to sleep as well. Same with walking around, playing, etc. Anytime I could do it without people noticing (even at that young age I didn’t want people asking me why I was saving a seat, the Invisible Friend sort of thing), I did.

When I was six, my family moved to a different part of town and we stopped attending the RCA church. When I was around ten, we (sans Dad) started attending a Missouri Synod Lutheran church. My brother refused to be enrolled in confirmation classes, and my mom decided not to fight that battle with him. Around this time I met a girl who became a good friend of mine who was Catholic. We never talked about our religions other than “Well, I can’t spend the night on Saturday night because I have to go to Mass on Sunday.” and a random discussion about the Saints. I remember I was jealous because she had all these awesome Saints to pray for her and to talk to and relate to and I didn’t! My mom wasn’t too thrilled with my Catholic friend, and I was instructed not to go to Mass with her. No explanation why, though.

Eventually my time came to take confirmation classes in the LCMS church, which fell at the worst time in my life. Three years, which basically covered my middle school years. I hated middle school, and middle school hated me. I became very depressed in the time and couldn’t comprehend a God who loved us who would leave me to such pain and depression. I was bullied and picked on considerably and just couldn’t understand why. My mom decided it was time for me to get my own Bible, so I picked one out that had a green cover (green’s my favorite color). I was forbidden by the LCMS pastor to read it during confirmation classes because it was a different translation from everyone else’s. I had my Small Catechism and my forbidden Bible, and I dutifully completed the classes so to keep my mom happy. I didn’t understand what I was being taught and was more concerned about route memorization that was required of me (Apostle’s Creed and it’s meaning, 10 Commandments and their meanings, Articles of Faith and it’s meaning, the books of the Bible). I remember apart of the classes discussed other religions, which wasn’t very enlightening other than “Catholics are wrong because they worship Mary. Lutheranism is correct because we don’t.”. Other religions, like Judaism, Mormonism, and other Protestant denominations were given the same treatment.

I remember I was interviewed by the elders of the church about my confirmation. They asked if I would continue to attend the Lutheran Church after my confirmation. I said I would, but mentally was thinking “NO WAY”. Not long after I was confirmed, we switched to a different LCMS church in town. Not long after my 16th birthday, we stopped attending all together.

There were some good things I remember about the first LCMS church. Such as, it was the local Lutheran Church for the deaf and hard of hearing people. My mom put me into the Sign Language Choir and enrolled me in sign language classes at the state’s School for the Deaf and Blind. I really enjoyed being in the Sign Choir – I could stand up in my little robe with other people each Sunday and sign all the songs for the Deaf people in attendance. We had a dedicated interpreter for the sermons. Just like the songs I remember from the RCA church, I still remember a LOT of sign language and a lot of songs in American Sign Language.

After I graduated high school, I went immediately to a community college. I was ready to get out of the house, away from my parents, and to do things for myself. The community college exposed me to GUYS, since apparently I was the plague in high school. I’d never had a boyfriend until I went to college, and I loved every minute of it. I never attended church at the community college, maybe once or twice with a friend. I ended up doing typical college kid things, wanting to be cool and everything with my friends. And because I could, I had no parent telling me what do and what not to do. Freedom! Total liberation. It was grand.

I ended up getting mixed up with a guy I shouldn’t have gotten mixed up with. I found myself in a pretty bad situation, all the freedom I had craved in high school and loved in college was taken away from me, used against me, and suddenly I found myself entirely powerless. The community college was small, everyone knew everyone else basically. I could have easily pressed charges and taken police action about what had happened, but I never did. And yes, I’m being purposely vague here with what happened.

After all that, I basically slid downhill into a lot of depression which I tried to get treated for, which was a disaster and basically became That Girl that you go to when you want to cheat on your girlfriend. I played pretty much every role in cheating – the other girl, the cheater, and the cheated. At one point in the midst of these unhealthy relationships I tried to become a serious Lutheran. I found prayers online that were foreign to me as a Lutheran, including this thing called the Sign of the Cross. Never did that in my Lutheran church! So I gave up and managed to get through my time at the community college and transferred to the University where I ended up getting my Geology degree.

Comments