About a decade ago, Emma came into my class, eager to learn. She was the dream eighth-grade student. She was funny and thoughtful, and she viewed the world through the eyes of someone much older. Her faith was deep, her understanding of Scripture mature, and her convictions sincere. I could go on, but she was the type of student who added needed depth to class discussions and learning activities. It was a great year, but unfortunately, with just a few weeks left in the school year, she informed me that her family had decided to move halfway around the world. Sad as I was to see her go, I was confident that she would head to that far-off land equipped and ready for the spiritual, academic, and social realities of high school.
Years passed, and, to my surprise, Emma showed up one day at the school. Now in her mid-20s, she was on her way to starting a master’s degree. Time passed quickly as we discussed life, school, and her old classmates. It was not long before I asked her about her walk with God and how she was adjusting to faith as a young adult. Bluntly she responded, “I don’t practice that faith anymore. Too many questions with not enough answers.” She added, “And way too much prayer with way too much silence and disappointment.” I was instantly reminded of the dangers of placing anyone on a pedestal. I couldn’t stop myself from blurting out the least compassionate thing I think I could have said at that moment: “Why?”
With her permission, I include some of the conversations that we have had over the past few years about faith and doubt and why trust was the central issue for her. She shared that her doubt was rooted in the inability of the Christian body to do anything regarding issues surrounding tough questions of the Christian faith. She noted that two particular areas created a lack of trust.
First, the faith of her youth contradicted itself when it came to the message of love and acceptance. She has noted that the faith did not do anything to address issues of cultural or gender insensitivity to women, to the poor and marginalized people of the world, or to the LGBTQ community. She commented on how this original doubt was festering into a bitter issue of trust with those who said they cared.
Second, after she moved away from our community, she developed severe depression, and the Christian community that her family had become part of told her to double-down on her faith and pray it away. Over a period of time, she began to reconsider her trust in God as a result of the actions of the people who called themselves Christians. She concluded that God must not be real because there is no way God could be so capricious and mean.
I think the most forthcoming statement she shared with me was regarding her own revelation to how doubt shaped and formed her own response to faith. “Christianity is such an awkward faith, [it’s] a funny paradox. It’s so easy to be oblivious and happy if you are willing to shut out the real issues, but how awkward and difficult it is to live it if you really try to trust in it!”
Emma and I still talk occasionally, via social media; I hope we will for a long time to come. The opportunity to hear about her unfolding story is a sacred gift. She has acknowledged that having someone listen anew has allowed her a wider view of her own journey. She is aware I pray for her and long to see her heal from any of the harm done in the past by misguided Christians, and she is quick to affirm that she sees a benefit from the “positive thoughts and energy” sent her way. She knows that she will heal from some of the past, likely within the context of her community.
Her story reminds me of the long game we play as teachers. Our deepest hope for our students is not to produce in them a short-term, cookie-cutter faith that provides pedestrian answers that wish away doubts. I believe that if we want our students to pursue a flourishing life full of real experiences in which they discover within the awkwardness of life, a deeper meaning in their journey, then we need to teach and embrace a biblical understanding of hospitality that bears witness to something that precedes us and exceeds us. As much as I would love to see Emma, or for that fact all my students, explore their life in light of Christ’s love, mercy, and compassion, I am assured that God’s call on us is to reimage a new way of exploring faith and doubts in the sacred gift of hospitality. A genuine ear and voice—to listen and discuss openly about real issues, real problems, and real aspects of faith and doubt—might just help our students place the echo chambers of the internet and the advice of peers into greater perspective.
Emma’s story will remain for me a picture of virtue and grace as it was an opportunity for me to exceed and step into the awkwardness of our real lives. It serves as a reminder that our students’ stories are not finished when they graduate, nor is our influence. That long game we play, of genuine hospitality, might allow us to be another part of God’s unfolding story in new and exciting and, yes, often awkward, ways.
C.F. Ward teaches social studies and Bible at Covenant Christian School in Leduc, Alberta. He is also a doctoral student at Carey Theological College in Vancouver, B.C.
