God and I reached an understanding. How can that be ,you say, you don't believe in God. Well here is the story and every word is exactly as it happened.
My wife and I are both agnostic, we didn't have our children baptized. We encouraged them to find their own beliefs, and as you can imagine in the south , they had lots of peer pressure to conform. When my daughter was in late middle school, early high school, I believe she was struggling with becoming aware of who she was. At the time, I did not know it, but she later came out gay. She asked me and her mother to take her to a very liberal baptist church on Christmas Eve. Of course we did,. We were delighted to find out that it had a gay female preacher.
As we sat in the back of the church, my daughter on my left and wife on my right, my daughter whispered that we were in the "gay section". We all smiled as we thought that is where we might most fit in.
Now here is the funny part. They had a little ceremony, where an usher walked up the aisle and distributed small candles that were passed down the aisle. The usher lit the first candle adjacent to the aisle, who lit the next person, etc. We all had our candles lit, the church was totally still, the doors were closed. As we leaned near each other, my candle suddenly blinked out. Neither my wives, nor my daughter's flame even moved.
My daughter smiled and whispered to me that "God doesn't want you here". I said to her, that we then had a shared understanding. He/ She didn't want me there, and I didn't want to be there. My daughter was happy, it was decided, none of us ever went inside a church again.
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I only go to church for weddings and I do not do many of them. My religious friend keeps telling me I can meet a good woman in church. What he fails to tell me is that if I go this route and it happens that I meet such a woman, she will soon be crying because an invisible part of me will end up in a make believe place of fire and it is all a plan of the invisible man. Ditto! We are back to convert or leave.
DenoPenno
Level 9
June 18, 2019
2
Is the "funny part" your assertiont that you have many wives?
Mofo1953
Level 9
June 17, 2019
2
Thanks for pointing out my error . 
Okaaaaayyy....so you think the candle flame going out really meant something? Or was it just a symbolic thing? A sign from the lesbian goddess on high? Or had you made the point with your daughter and that was enough for all of you? Lots of mixed metaphors and such. Not making fun. Was it a 'real' thing, or a coincidence which solidified a deeper substance?
Storm1752
Level 8
June 17, 2019
1
Storm1752 . I don't believe in God or supernatural. It is just funny the way it happened. I ascribe nothing to it but good luck!
@Bigwavedave Right, but how can a baptist church REALLY be liberal? Don't get me wrong, it's nice of them to confer human status to homosexuals, but obviously you left and never went back because it was self-contradictory at it's core, right? And the candle just a funny aside?.
Obviously.
@Storm1752 I went to support my daughters desire to explore. Yes Baptists in general are pretty terrible. This seemed to be a Christian church that appeared to actually care about people. Still didnt affect my non belief. I was helping my daughter find hers.
@Bigwavedave Right. Good for you.
S oyou have an understanding with your imagination wow are you so great.
benhmiller
Level 7
June 17, 2019
0
@benhmiller... sorry you have no sense of humor . That must suck.
I provided no religious training to my children other than my persistent philosophical rumblings, but now I’m trying to atone for my earlier neglect.
Here’s a great religious song that skado recently posted, and I have forwarded it to my adult children for their edification:
WilliamFleming
Level 8
June 17, 2019
8
@WILLIAMFLEMING I so playing this for my daughter today . Lol. Thank you!
@Bigwavedave Thanks are due to skado. Problem with the song is that I keep laughing whenever I think about it. Is that healthy?
tears..ha ha ha ha ha ha....
Lmmfao!!!!!
HILARIOUS!
That made me smile! Thanks for the laugh.
Funny/cute/slightly creepy story haha. The idea of a child smiling to tell me god doesn’t want you here seems like a horror movie trope, but my answer would be the same. There was actually a gay section and a straight section at the church? strange, wonder why? Either the pastor was addressing the two groups with different info or as a visual signal so everyone could use it as a dating mixer like most churches wind up sort of being anyways? Either way I’m sure it was cooler than any church I’ve been to, and still wouldn’t necessarily wanna be there.
Wurlitzer
Level 8
June 17, 2019
3
@wurlitzer mmm I don't think it was necessarily that way, but that was my daughters observation. Could just be all the late arrivals in the back, so gay plus heathen section, eh?
@Bigwavedave lol yeah a lot of newer people checking it out for the first time for the same reason no doubt.
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