in nomine patri
The Trinity Church, located just outside the Trinity Arcade on St Georges Terrace, is always open at lunchtime for those who may want to seek some time for solitude and prayer. And everytime I walk past during lunch, I peer inside, a rudimentary social gauge of the piety of West Australian Christians. It is always empty.
Today was different. I stopped,and looked inside, seeing the empty pews, the hushed silence. I looked around, watching the city bustle quickly past me in seemingly important errands. I entered slowly. It was the first time I'd been in a church for a long while. I've previously discussed the reasons why and the extent of my beliefs, so I won't delve into it here, for those who may be surprised by the revelation.
I slowly genuflected, and as I did so the back of my head prickled, the hair on my nape bristling. My heart started beating furiously, my head suddenly lightheaded. I experienced a rush of adrenaline, and curiously, joy. Someone is watching me. I looked around, but there was no one else there. I started breathing heavily. I couldn't explain it, but it felt like..I was in the presence of the Divine.
Or it was a sudden rush of endorphins and other chemicals caused by some physiological reaction to my entrance into the church. I may believe in God, but I'm also not blind to Science. Either way, I had experienced something strange, something unexplained. Is this what our ancestors felt, so many thousands of years ago? This unexplained reaction to something, or nothing, that could only be explained by them as that of the work of a superior being? And from there a religion is born, pantheons and demi-gods, prophets and sinners, layered by commandments and admonishments, canon and apocrypha, from which different interpretations and schisms are born. And bad men shed the blood of each other for something much worse than greed or survival, while good men toil unthanked and unknown.
I rose shakily to my feet, and knelt at the pews. And I prayed. When it was over, I stepped outside, exhaled, and lost myself in the nameless crowd.
posted by jaseypoo! @ 8:48 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home