My Parent's Conversion: The Beginning of Change

“Certain things, they should stay the way they are. You ought to be able to stick them in one of those big glass cases and just leave them alone.” 

― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

My brothers and I attended Sunday school at Grace Church for many years. My mom would drop us off in the morning and afterwards we walked the two and a half blocks home in good weather. For my little friends in class it was a different matter as they had to go to church afterwards with their parents. I considered myself lucky to escape that. However, at one point around the sixth grade my mom decided that she was coming back to church. I do not know what preceded this decision.

She joined the choir and suddenly we were required to attend church services. Since we did not understand what was going on, I would have been happy to be seated in the middle of the congregation, or preferably, in the back. But my mom, with the fervor of a new believer, placed us up in the front row to the sympathy of my little friends who were luckier in their seating arrangements.

There were other changes as well. After finding out that a couple of families read a chapter of the Bible every night after dinner we were also required to. And yes, we slogged through the so-and-so begat so-and-so chapters in the Old Testament.

All that was missing was the patriarch to preside over this newly formed Christian family. My mom started an all out campaign to convert my dad. He was a tough nut to crack but after a visit from the pastor, he bowed his head and accepted Jesus into his heart. Finally we could go to church and look just like everyone else. However, the bar was raised still higher. Suddenly we were being compared to other church kids and not favorably. Everyone was better than us and we had to step up the Christian program. My mom began using what was known as "the heavy sigh" followed by a dramatic slump of the shoulders to communicate just how disappointed she was in us. It was a favorite used at Christmas and other holidays. It was perplexing and no one knew what she wanted. Open presents in a more godly way?

Morning services were interminably long and boring. Evenings were a bit better since the custom was to let the kids sit wherever they wanted, usually in the back, and play when the parents visited after church. We had the pastor and his wife over for dinner and were fitting in nicely with the rest of the church.

The summer before I started the eighth grade my dad brought us kids together in the kitchen and said he had signed us up for the Christian school where most of the churchgoers sent their kids. I was not happy at first but quickly adapted to my new school and for the most part, enjoyed my new life. After all, even with the limited once-a-week exposure, I had known all these kids since first grade.

The Bible classes exposed me to a more rigid structure of belief and although I had questions, I did not ask them or in any way challenge my teachers. My friends seemed to accept everything that was taught so I just went along. They made sure we had lots of fun and kept us busy in many ways and honestly, I was too young to think critically for myself.

After just one year my father announced we were moving all the way across the country to California. It seemed as though change and adapt was going to be my modus operandi.