Scary Basement Jesus.

I think I break my Irish-Catholic parents’ hearts.  My mother often passes on forwards to me and luckily, after about 10 years of silence or eye-rolling replies, I’ve finally instilled in them that if it was political or religious, I wanted nothing to do with those messages.  A few days ago, my mother, (probably deciding to take a chance and hoping I’d react like an adult,) sent me the following email- which started out innocently.

A little girl wanted to know what the United States looked like. Her Father tore  a map of the United States  out of his magazine and cut it into small pieces.  He gave them to her and said, ‘Go into the other room and see if you can put this together. This will show you our whole country today..’

After some minutes, she returned and handed him the map, correctly fitted and taped together. The father was surprised and asked how she had finished so quickly.  ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘on the other side of the paper is a picture of Jesus.  When I got all of Jesus back where He belonged, then our country just came together.’

First of all? There’s no way a kid said that.  It’s no longer funny when you can tell someone placed words in a child’s mouth to try to make the story seem cuter, instead of the usual propaganda.

At the bottom of the email was the same Jesus, (arms outstretched and pained reaction,) that I saw from the mantle of my parent’s wood paneled basement.  “Scary Basement Jesus” haunted most dark nights.  I swear to you that his glow in the dark eyes and the heart that resided magically, (with flames!) on the outside of his chest spoke to me in ways that Nightmare on Elm Street never, ever, could.

Now,  I never claimed that I don’t often open my mouth prematurely, or my fingers don’t sometimes hit keys with pure emotion more than they should but I replied to this message.  I said something about throwing up and adding a ‘smiley’ icon, (because who can get mad at you when a smiley icon is present afterwords. It’s the proverbial, “I don’t want to offend you but…”) I threw up on my mother’s well-meant email. Literally- all over it.

My mom’s reply was priceless.  She added a frowny face and a snide mark about knowing better about sending spiritually-charged emails to her progressive and searching cafeteria-non-organized religion daughter, (who happens to pray nightly with her preschooler, thankyouverymuch.)  My father’s words spoke differently. “I have no idea why Katie disses and hates anything God or Jesus related. You would think that with her blessings she wouldn’t be so hostile.”

See? Awkward. If I hadn’t gotten this email in the first place I would never had the incredible push to strike back at people who spend their days making up emails to forward about how all this country needs is ONE, solitary source, (white/male/awesome,) to bring us all together.  In theory, it sounds fantastic- magical, even.  But the theory fades when I watch good friends who are Jewish,  Muslim or Atheist struggle with the same question, “But who is right?”  Instead of funneling everyone into the same beliefs, I wish my parents could understand the beauty behind learning and experiencing other views and ideas.  We don’t really need Jesus, we just need to be BETTER. In all reality: they are owed a lot for having a cynical child as their spawn.

I pray everynight to whomever is up there and close my eyes because I think that meaning it- will make the wishes for my daughter’s health, strength and happiness happen. I know prayer does nothing but unleash our fears onto something else- and I’m completely and utterly happy with this pretense.  Sometimes, I’ll be driving home and catch my daughter’s gleeful expression in the backseat and a gorgeous sunset out my window and I’ll wonder what I did to deserve such a magnificent splendor of beauty and grace. I think those moments- are what make me believe that it’s more than just religion. There’s a heart to what I believe, but I’m just not ready to call it anything but, “GOD,” yet.

My poor parents.  They have no other mold to put me in besides the one they created. I hope that as few as they check this, (for all they know I blog about unicorns and street drugs,) that they know I love them- so much that I’ll not only send them a message with a smiley icon that apologizes, but I’ll go online to share with the world that even though I threw up on Scary Basement Jesus, I meant well. (Really.)