If I Could Have Been Christian, I Would Be

One of the reasons why evangelical Christians upset me so much is that they fail to understand that I’ve already tried Christianity and it broke my heart that I couldn’t be one.

For people who believe that Christianity is the only true path to God, it’s impossible for them to understand how a person could actually be introduced to it, be part of it, try it, and reject it. That must be some devil work, right?

The fact is, I tried with everything I had to be Christian and I couldn’t do it.

Why did I try so hard?

When I was in college I fell head over heels in love with an evangelical Christian young man. I went to the Christian group because I was looking for other kids with similar values to mine. I was afraid of everything I had heard about partying and drinking at college.

Being a white American, I figured I was a Christian. We’d gone to a liberal church when I was growing up (along with also going to SES and meditating, chanting in Sanskrit, studying the Gita, etc.)

It took me only five minutes of being at the service to realize that I was not at all a Christian like these people were. But I was already sucked in. The man leading the service that evening on our college campus was alight with blazzing energy.

His charisma radiated from his skin, his dazzling smile had me hypnotized in an instant. He guided the service, introduced speakers, was a constant source of joy in that room.

I fell in love instantly.

People roll their eyes and say they believe in lust at first sight, but even though he was beautiful and his hands were long and thin and gorgeous, it wasn’t lust that I felt. It was some kind of synergy of spirit.

I felt an overwhelming urge to make this man part of my life. I had to get to know him. I didn’t know how. After all, he was already graduated and working at the school while I was in my first week, making him six years older than me (a pretty significant difference when you’re 18). He was Black and I had very few interactions with anyone Black. He was a full fledged Christian and at this moment I had no idea what I was. We were so different and yet, as I later found out, we were alike in so many ways too.

There was an announcement about small Bible study groups and he was leading one of them. I signed up immediately. I hadn’t planned to ever come back, but instead I began my very Christian college experience. I went to the group every Friday night and eventually the Bible study too (there was some mix up where he assumed it was a joke of some kind and didn’t put me on the list. I think he could tell just looking at me that I didn’t belong).

I got to know the object of my admiration and he lived up to my every expectation. We quickly became very good friends. We talked long into the night about religion and philosophy and beliefs. We went to Friendly’s and Niagara Falls. He introduced me to milkshakes. He always listened to me and cared about what I had to say, even though I was a sheltered 18 year old. I craved being near him and joined the campus Gospel Choir because he was in it.

But there were two problems: He had a long distance girlfriend and I wasn’t a Christian.

I started thinking maybe I could pass for one. I knew the language. And I could put my beliefs into language that evangelical Christians could understand. But one night in our small group Bible study we were supposed to tell our “testimonial stories.” This is the story one uses while evangelizing, telling people of the moment when you “accepted Jesus Christ into your heart.”

I told a story about the night that I was at an SES retreat and I had just found out that the man I had gone on a date with (my first date ever, and a part of a potential arranged marriage) had married someone else. It was a huge blow to me even though I didn’t know or care for the man himself that much. I spent the whole night locked in a stall in the bathroom, the only place I had privacy, and wept. I cried and raged with God. I begged to understand why I was never good enough, why no one wanted me. And then I felt…comfort. I felt a presence that soothed me. It was the most profound moment of my life.

As I finished the story, one of the other people in the group said, “And that’s when you asked Jesus to come into your heart?”

“Well, no, I didn’t know I was supposed to do that.”

And so it came out that I had no testimonial. That I had not been “saved.”

The object of my love already knew that, of course. We talked about everything.

As far as his girlfriend went, I worked very hard to be respectful of her and their relationship. I felt a need to be around him all the time, but I never acted inappropriately and neither did he (I didn’t allow boys in my dorm room at all, so we always hung out in groups or in pubic). When she came to visit, I made sure to welcome her heartily and become her friend so she would know that I wasn’t trying to steal her man. I loved him, but I loved him with the kind of selfless love that meant I wanted his happiness more than my own and I had no desire at all to mess up his relationship.

My dream was, as it still is, as it has always been, to marry young, be a devoted housewife, and raise a bunch of children. I saw people in our Christian group pairing off rapidly. It looked so easy for them.

It’s always felt like my life would be a lot simpler if I were able to be Christian.

It is my occupying this strange space of both white American and Hindu that makes me so unusual and difficult to understand. It was that confusion that made it take so many more years for me to find a husband who understood me.

If I was a Christian than maybe when the object of my love broke up with his long distance girlfriend, maybe we would have been together.

I blew my chance to tell him how I felt. Though I’m sure he must have known.

He asked one night if I “liked” a friend if I would say something or not. I said I would because I was dying to know what friend he was talking about! But obviously the truth was that I wouldn’t. Because I hadn’t told him.

He told me he liked a girl that I didn’t know very well. She was a friend of a friend and I hadn’t really clicked with her when I met her. I realized that if he dated her, I wouldn’t be able to suddenly become her friend like I had with his previous girlfriend. It was too late for me to be part of both their lives, since it would be obvious that I was befriending her just to stay close to him.

Their relationship was a whirlwind, as many evangelical Christian love stories are. They courted for some time and he prayed a lot about God’s will for his life. Within the year they were getting married.

I had encouraged him to find a wife. I told him he needed a wife to take care of him. That was the sum total of my knowledge about the world: men need good wives. “Behind every great man is a great woman (and she belongs in the background.)” I wanted to be that wife. I wanted to take care of him, support him emotionally, but I knew it could never happen.

Attending that wedding was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.

He and I were such a good match in so many ways. I often felt like I could read his mind because I knew him that well. I got his humor and I knew his struggles. We had so much fun together.  I couldn’t help feeling like if I had just been able to be Christian, we would be together.

The only thing that prevented me from trying to fake it was knowing that I’d never be able to lie to my children and tell them that I believed the resurrection story. I didn’t believe it. I couldn’t, no matter how hard I tried.

I’ve spoken to him a little about my feelings since then. We write emails once in a while. He always checks in on my birthday. He says he never loved me “in that way.” I think I overwhelmed him because I always saw the best in him and his confidence level wasn’t high enough to believe what I saw in him. But it was there. He was and is an amazing man and I have huge respect and admiration for him. (And to be fair, he may also have simply not found me that attractive).

He cared for me thoughout college and really looked out for me. I know that he loved me in a sibling way at least. For me, he was my first love and I would have done anything for him. Anything I could. But as it turns out, being Christian I couldn’t do even for the man I loved that much.

I left for graduate school and it was there that I joined a Hindu student’s group and realized that I’d been a Hindu all along.

Back in college I used to go to church services and could enjoy the feeling of God even if I called Him by another name. Now I can’t really do it anymore. Christian services and talk of Jesus only remind me of everything I feel like I gave up because I couldn’t believe the resurrection story.