Writing Workshop: The girl with faith in her hands

My childhood self sits, bum balanced on the kneeler in front of the pew on which her mother sits, wriggly brother on lap, as she listens to the voice of her father from the front of the church.

In her careful, cupped hands sits the round orange of her Christingle, which she had helped the women of the church assemble that afternoon, one of hundreds, one for everyone, her tummy full of sultanas and raisins that she had spent the time popping into her mouth when no-one was looking. Her nose is filled with the smell of hot wax and the sharp tang of citrus as she watches the flame burn and flicker. Her father’s voice tells what each symbol represents: the orange is the world, red ribbon the blood of Jesus and others that she now forgets. But she doesn’t hear, doesn’t need to, the meanings as familiar, then, to her as the grainy wood of the church pew and the rough, worn fabric of the hymn books, more lost in the candle’s burn, for there seems to be some meaning in that, though she can’t fathom it.

She is six or seven. Utterly safe. Utterly loved. Her world is as certain and steadfast as her father’s confident sermon. That’s what faith is, I guess.

There aren’t many times where I miss the religious aspects of my upbringing. As someone that can find meaning in a dirty puddle these days, or the way the trees move, I never feel like I ‘need’ to believe in a specific religious teaching. Well, it’s more fundamental that, less that I need to believe, more that I just don’t. I’m quite happy enough feeling my way on my own and enormously grateful for the freedom and the sense of peace shaking off most of childhood beliefs has brought me. But as the daughter of a Baptist Minister, my dad later becoming a lay reader in a busy Anglican church, religion has always been something very firmly entrenched in my experience and in my memory.

Christmas is the one time I miss it. I almost ache with it. It’s not a spiritual longing, more a deep-set nostalgia, but I find myself drawn to the churches and the choirs, the candle-lit vigils and the nativity scenes. It makes me feel like a child again. Yes, I think that’s what it is. It makes me feel safe, held in a familiar blanket where everything is certain and predictable, where the sheep always follow the shepherds down the aisle to be placed in the straw filled stable, where you primary concern is whether or not you’ll be chosen to carry one, maybe even one of the more important ones, cradling the the tiny, swaddling-wrapped Jesus solemnly past the rows of the congregation  to place him in the manger.

I almost wish I could believe again, maybe even just pretend, just to have that feeling back.

So this Christmas I have a feeling that a girl, now long grown, may be found sneaking back into churches to light a candle and listen to soar of the Christmas carols, her mouth still shaping the words, all of which she remembers. Not to believe, but just to remember.

Yes, I think I would like that a lot.

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This post was written for this week’s Writing Workshop, a mix of childhood remembering and traditions.

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