Last God Standing (19 page)

“There’s something about him. He’s got this crazy charisma. Like Jackie Wilson and JFK all rolled into one. He’s religious, but not a pain in the ass about it. He lets you make up your own mind. He tells me to trust my fear.”

“Trust your fear.”

“Owen says fear is highly underrated. That it’s God’s way of telling us how ineffectual we are.”

“He preaches fear?”

“All the time. Owen says our society has become arrogant. He says we should embrace our fears, let them guide us through life’s uncertainties: if more people operated consciously out of fear we’d all progress toward ‘gentler, more pragmatic solutions for the ills that plague modern man’.”

“That’s different.”

“Well I think it’s refreshing. I mean haven’t you had enough of all this ‘follow your dreams’ horseshit? If I hear one more menopausal hausfrau whining on
Oprah
about ‘following her dreams’ I’ll snap. My ‘dream’ is to bust a cap in every broad who drops her panties for Oprah.”

“You love Oprah.”

“I’m a glutton for punishment. That’s why I married your father, the bastard. Get off here… right now.”

I swooped across three lanes of traffic, accompanied by an angry chorus of horns as drivers swerved to avoid Barbara’s brand new Jaguar. The driver I cut off swerved into the slow lane and slammed on her brakes just as the driver behind her attempted to jam his car into the exact space at that same moment. More squealing brakes followed by the sound of crunching metal. The “screw you” chorus of horns retreated into the rear distance as we sped up the exit ramp.

“I can’t imagine how you got a driver’s license. Anyway, when Owen looked me in the eye it was like he was looking at me. Not the glamorous creature I present to you and your gay friends. He saw the real me.”

“He saw all that with one look?”

“Yes. And I think he liked what he saw.”

“Big scotch drinker.”

“Nothing you say can knock me from my perch, my darling. Your old mama is feeling pretty good about herself these days. And it’s all thanks to Owen’s teachings.”

“Fear is good?”

“You bet your ass. In a world filled with con artists and zombie Asian streetwalkers… fear makes sense.”

She tossed her cigarette out the window.

“Why don’t you come to the lesson with me? God knows you could use a little spiritual renewal.”

“I told you… I’m busy.”

Barbara sighed. “Well, I guess I have no one to blame but myself. Herb and I were never big churchgoers.”

“You’re atheists. Or at least you were before you met Doc Holiday.”

“What is that, some kind of sick joke?”

“Are you serious? His name is Holiday. He has a doctoral degree. Which makes him officially Doc Holiday.”

“That’s the most ignorant thing I’ve ever heard.”

“It never occurred to you that someone might call him Doc Holiday?”

“No it didn’t. And I’d appreciate it if you don’t utter such foolishness when Owen’s around. He’s a serious man.”

“Alright.”

“I swear to God… the things that come out of your mouth. Doc Holiday–”

“I said alright!”

“It’s just that you’ve never managed to aquire any kind of moral philosophy. Everyone needs to believe in something greater than themselves, Lando. If you missed out on that… I’m sorry.”

Of all the things I’d come to expect from my mother, an apology was not among them: Barbara never apologized. She made others apologize, even when they’d done nothing wrong. Her “moral philosophy” crouched somewhere in the dark alley between self righteousness and homicidal self-righteousness.

“Actually I do believe in something greater than myself.”

“Oh? What is it? Trees? Coffee beans? Some Hindu crap?”

“Mother dear, you can’t call an entire religion ‘crap’ because you disagree with it.”

“Watch me. When was the last time you attended a normal old Christian church?”

“Gods don’t need a church to hear the prayers of their worshippers.”

“Well who died and made you Jerry Falwell? Christ I hope you’re not falling into one of those Buddhist/ Scientology cult things like your buddy Yorga.”

“His name is Yuri, Barbara. And he only experimented with Scientology for a year.”

“Yeah, Yuri. Good hair. Nice package. I’d pay good money to ‘convert’ him, but considering the crowd you hang out with he’s probably a homo.”

“You may be the worst person ever to draw breath.”

“And the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, my darling. Remember that. Pull in here… right now.”

The New Message Non-Denominational Fellowship Center was a squarish, postmodern structure covered with particolored glass. After a stint as a health club, a family planning clinic and a gay nightclub, the church sat empty for nearly fifteen years until it was bought by Owen Holiday. Now, the giant Rubik’s Cube’s parking lot was filled to near capacity, closed due to overcrowding. Four or five News trucks haunted the area near the front entrance and several camera crews were loading their equipment in through the main doors.

“I thought this was just a bible study class.”

Barbara smiled, a knowing grin playing about her lips.

“Owen’s been attracting a lot of media attention lately. Last month the mayor joined New Message.”

“I thought the mayor was Jewish.”

“Guess she saw the light. We also have several Bulls, a couple of Blackhawks, and that kid Senator from Hyde Park. You should talk your hot friend into coming. Owen’s making a lot of headway with idiots your age.”

We had to park three blocks away. As she climbed out of the car, Barbara hectored me about going inside.

“Can’t you get your guru to bring you back home?”

“Oh… Owen’s busy. I wouldn’t even ask. Come with me.”

“No.”

“I guess now is as good a time as any to tell you: I’m dying, Lando.”

I stared at her for a full thirty seconds before she gave up.

“Oh alright. Will you please accompany me inside, O handsome-but-annoyingly-principled son of mine?”

I noted the air of twitchy excitement that haunted Barbara’s movements, her degree of pharmaceutical inebriation, and decided it was probably best if I went with her. I was also intrigued by the things she’d told me about Holiday and his strange philosophy. He’d filled up the church’s parking lot on a Wednesday night. I was curious. And, I was actually enjoying the banter between Barbara and me. Jousting with her felt like home. A home for the criminally deranged, but the only home I’d ever known. Besides, my set at the Ha-Ha Room wasn’t until 10.30pm – I could afford a short detour into the circus tent that had opened its flaps to my mother.

The tall, open doors of the sanctuary yawned before us. Inside, we could hear shouts, laughter, and a single amplified voice calling for worshippers to take their seats: the circus was about to begin. We went in through the main entrance, down a long dark hallway that led to the chapel. The walls were strangely bare. No paintings or pictures adorned the colorless expanse of organic eggshell blandness. Up ahead, bright light poured out of the chapel, welcoming visitors to step inside, out of the void and into the warmth and brightness.

Barbara was clutching my forearm in her talons and giggling like a panicky teenager on her first date.

We went into the light.

“God gave me a revelation this morning. I’d like to share that Word with you all, and with the many friends and fellow seekers all over the world who are watching us on television and the web right now: we… are… children.”

The approximately two thousand people crammed into the auditorium rumbled as the regular congregants replied.

“Children.”

“That’s right!”

“Amen!”

Owen Holiday and his board of private investors had bought the abandoned elementary school that sat directly behind the church. Using donations from congregants and a few wealthy converts among Chicago’s elites, they’d incorporated the school’s theater and gymnasium and created the new “Gathering Place.”

A line of television cameras occupied the open area at the front of the auditorium, a glittering phalanx of electronic eyes and ears, all trained on the man at the podium.

Holiday wore a simple denim shirt with the sleeves rolled up, clean khakis and comfortable loafers. With his sun-darkened skin and steel gray hair he looked like a latter day Marlboro Man without the Marlboro. There was something extravagant in his faded cowboy sincerity, a silent violence revealed only in the tension of his bunched jaw muscles. His hands closed into fists repeatedly as he looked out over the audience. A kind of personal rigor resonated across the palette of his movements. The impression I’d received in my parents’ kitchen was only reinforced: Owen Holiday was no stranger to brutality.

“Most of you folks know me. I’ve visited with you in your homes, meditated with you, celebrated your victories and wept for your losses. I’ve broken bread in tough times with many of you. Last couple of years I’ve put on ten pounds.”

The congregation laughed. Some of them applauded.

“Always start with a joke,” I whispered into Barbara’s ear. “Gets ’em on your side.”

“We know each other,” Holiday said, “as only companions who have walked the same hard road for many years can know each other. So you will all understand what it means when I tell you that this morning as I was preparing for tonight’s message, I found myself uncertain and afraid. I was afraid because I realized that everything upon which this church was founded was an illusion, that I was nothing more than a charlatan and a false prophet. I’ve been lying to you good people all along.”

We were sitting only a few rows away from the raised stage Holiday commanded, like Othello moments before he guts himself. We’d been led to these seats by an eager acolyte, who’d breathlessly informed us that special arrangements had been made to ensure that Barbara be given priority seating.

Holiday spoke softly, his accent part Northern Montana/part Southern Illinois, amplified by the microphone.

“I don’t believe in God.”

No one moved. Holiday had captured his audience with a ruthless economy.

“I had just stepped out of the shower. I took a look at myself in my bathroom mirror. I’m fifty-three years old, in pretty fair shape. But I’ve been so busy these last few weeks I’ve neglected what my father used to call my “ablutions”. My five o’clock shadow looked more like 3am on a bender: I needed a shave. It had been a while since I’d laid eyes on this old fencepost I call a face. So I set to it.

“While I was mixing my shaving powder, I began thinking about what I was going to say to you good people tonight. I do my best thinking when I’m shaving. It clears my head. Something about that cold blade against my mortal flesh puts life into perspective. But this morning, nothing was coming to me. I kept at it: my beard grows fast, and if I don’t keep after it, after a couple of days I can pass for a member of the Taliban.”

This elicited a rumble of good-natured laughter.

“Usually, as my face starts to reveal itself, my thoughts get clearer, and by the time I’m done I’ve got the nitty-gritty of that evening’s message. But this time… nothing. I was halfway through my ablutions and nothing was coming to me. I don’t mind telling you, friends, that was enough to set my mind whirling. And at that moment, Evil came upon me in the form of a paralyzing doubt. Who are you kidding, Owen, I asked myself. You know this is all just a lie. You’ve reached the end of your ability to fool yourself. You have no illusions left to hide behind and now you’re faced with the truth: there is no God.”

The voices of several congregants lifted against the silence.

“Don’t lose faith!”

“We need you, Owen!”

Holiday bowed his head. His hands gripped the lectern so tightly that his knuckles turned white. When he raised his face, his cheeks were wet with tears. Many of the congregants broke into applause.

“We love you, Owen!”

Holiday raised his hands, commanding silence.

“Your love and support just fill me up. Without you folks I’d… well I don’t know where I’d be. I know some of you are horrified. I can see it. But for just one moment, friends, I’ll admit that I experienced a keening joy, a personal satisfaction. At that moment I sensed a new path stretching out in front of me. I don’t mind telling you, folks, that I was ready to take a step upon that road, ready to throw everything I had worked for out that bathroom window and set off on a dark new adventure. I felt… free.”

Barbara was nodding her head. All around us, many of the congregants were nodding as well.

“I finished up my shave with a feeling of exhilaration. By the time I cleaned my razor – I still use a straight razor; that cold hard edge scraping at my throat helps me ‘keep it real,’ as the kids like to say – I was ready to make a public proclamation. I was going to let it all go. Heck, everybody knows what I had just allowed myself to admit, right? Everybody knows there’s really no such a thing as a loving God who watches over us, who guides our actions and decides our destinies. We all should just admit it, forget about archaic notions of God’s divine presence. Why, science tells us more and more about the world every single day. They’re drinking water from underground ice springs on the moon. They’ve found oceans filled with life on two of Saturn’s moons. What does faith in God count for in this big ol’ random universe?

“We look around at the state the world’s in and see hunger on a global scale, children dying in wars that no one ever wins; we see terrorists killing innocents by the thousands in our greatest cities and getting away unscathed by anybody’s justice; we see our very planet losing its ability to sustain itself. But no God steps in to save us. We pray, we all believe, we say, ‘Well, if He is out there he must be working His mysteries, His wonders to perform, in ways we mere mortals can’t see.’ But then what, my friends, is the point of praying to this being who never intercedes on our behalf?”

Holiday stepped out from behind the lectern and began to walk slowly along the edge of the stage, like a man walking the plank knowing that sharks swim in the dark waters below.

“Well I stood there, clean shaven, feeling like a million bucks; like that young fellow I remember, fresh out of seminary and ready to set the world on fire. I got out my cell phone and dialed brother Erikson’s number. Fred Erikson’s my First Deacon in our little family of faith; I figured he could take over while I prepared everyone for this new revelation. I called his number…

“That’s when I heard the voice.”

Holiday seemed to meet every eye in that room, a direct communication with each living, breathing soul.

“This voice was one that I’d never heard before, but in the instant it spoke I knew it for what it was. It was the calming Voice at the heart of a Kansas twister; the whisper at the center of the flame that burns at the heart of the sun and in the heart of you and me. This Voice said three words to me:

“You. Are. Children.”

The camera crews were watching, recording Holiday’s every word and movement. One man, a burly AfricanAmerican holding a boom microphone over his head, wept openly, his head shaking back and forth, shoulders shuddering with the force of his sobs.

What’s happening here?

I glanced toward Barbara. She was crying.

“Children,” she whispered. “Innocents.”

The gunshot made everyone scream.

People leapt to their feet. Holiday was standing center stage. In his right hand he gripped a small revolver, a starter pistol. It was aimed at the ceiling, its barrel still smoking.

“A shot in the darkness! That’s what it was like, friends. And at that moment I was swept up by such wonder that it seemed the whole room caught fire, and I was filled with a burning light. This light burned away all doubt as to Whom I was speaking. It burned away my certainty in the blinking of an eye, and it was angry.

“‘You are children,’ it said again. ‘What do you mean, Father?’ I cried. ‘We are lost and we cannot see! How can we go on when we’re all blind?’”

“‘Once, there was nothing but darkness,’ this Voice said. ‘A void, without time, or light or life. Then God created Eden; a place so filled with joy it was like a shining beacon against all that darkness. And into Eden God brought life, animals and plants and every living thing. Finally, he brought forth Man Adam and Woman Eve. But they were as children, ignorant of God’s plan. “Walk where I guide you,” God said, “for I am your Father, and you know nothing of this world.” And they walked that way for a while, living as God decreed. And they were happy.’ But we all know what happened next: Adam and Eve were cast out of Eden. Why? Because they took that first step away from God. For they had eaten from what…?”

“The Tree of Knowledge,” the congregants murmured.

“Yes!” Holiday thundered. “Philosophers tell us that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Adam and Eve were cast out. Sure, they gained awareness, but they lost their innocence, and they were separated from the will of God. They became as adults, wandering through a world filled with heartbreak and wondering why everything is so messed up. But we all know why: we are children who have defied our father. Our omnipotent, omnipresent and loving father. We defy Him, and so we fail.”

“We fail!”

One voice started the chant. That voice came from Barbara. Someone else repeated the phrase. A second later, hundreds of congregants were repeating it.

“We fail!”

“That’s right!” Holiday shouted. “Against hunger!”

“We fail!”

“Against greed and corruption and moral recalcitrance!”

“We fail!”

“Against racism and sexual deviance and child murdering terrorists, and every evil thing that crawls upon the face of God’s blessed Earth…”

“We fail!”

“Against war and poverty and selfish politicians…”

“We fail!”

Holiday threw back his head and howled, “We… fail!”

The cry was echoed by weeping and shouting and calls for punishment. The air in the arena had taken on the ugly scent of the atmosphere before a riot. But Holiday looked rejuvenated. More robust somehow. More… vigorous.

“Feels good to admit it, yes? We fail. And because we fail, because we are ignorant children playing in our Father’s kingdom, we have strayed from perfection and harmony… and peace.”

“We fail.”

“We have wandered off the path lain for us by the Supreme Shepherd to stumble along ways and roads utterly of our own devising. And in all that wilful meandering we wandered away from Eden.”

Holiday’s face beamed certitude. Barely contained brutality shone from his eyes, flashing across the congregants like the beams from a haunted lighthouse.

“But I know the way back. I know how to get right with God and return to Eden. I know how every man, woman and child within the range of my voice can set their feet upon the road back to God’s mercy; for we have sinned, and God’s mercy is the only thing that can redeem us. We have forsaken the greatest gift our Father gave us. That gift is fear.”

“Amen!”

“Fear is wisdom!”

“Bless you, Owen!”

“My friends, the troubles of this world are many and dire. To fear them is only sensible: Fear reminds us of our place in His Great Plan. It tells us how insignificant we truly are.

“Other preachers tell you about a loving God, a kind and forgiving God. Yes, friends, our God is kind and forgiving. He woke me up this morning and enabled me to share His revelations with you and that’s the greatest kindness of all. But our God’s love is not what they call ‘unconditional’. His love is utterly ‘conditional’. And we have violated the conditions upon which we can earn his Grace. Our God is angry.”

That word swept among the congregants, the first breath of wildfire across an arid plain.

“Angry!”

“He’s angry!”

“God is ticked off!”

“Friends, our heavenly Father is furious with us, his errant children. And the only thing that can save us from his wrath is to step back onto the path he has ordained for us, a path he has given me to know.”

Holiday’s eyes scanned the faces of his flock.

“Who will join me on the road to redemption? It won’t be easy, and many will fall along the way. The faithless. The scientists, who believe more what their telescopes and their test tubes and their stem cells tell them than what any fool can read in the Old Testament.”

One man, a tall, bald biker type, shouted, “Damned fools!”

“Ahh, but we can’t worry about them, friends. Their fate is in their hands, and their hands are too small! It’s with God that I plan to walk, and with God’s eternal grace, I’m hoping you all will come with me. Return with me… to a New Eden.”

They were moving before he stopped speaking, a mass of congregants rising as if with one mind, and shuffling into the aisles. Barbara stood up. I gripped her forearm.

“Where are you going?”

Barbara tugged, somewhat listlessly at my grasp, her face turned toward Holiday.

“Barbara-Jean, this is the Voice of Reason speaking.”

She glared at me with such grieving that I dropped her forearm. If I’d passed her on the street at that moment I might not have recognized her.

“Go home, Herbert,” she said. “I’ll be fine.”

Then she stepped out into the aisle and joined the flood of shuffling congregants. Nearly every congregant who was capable of independent movement was filing down toward the stage, where their comrades gathered like horny salmon at the entrance to a spawning ground.

Owen Holiday stood over his flock, the Holy Grizzly scanning the depths, waiting for the fattest fish to pass beneath his eye. He nodded at Barbara, who beamed up at him, devotion streaking her cheeks and tumbling in silent praise from her lips. When he looked at me, the great white grin that stretched his face gleamed with dark promises; a violent salvation; grievous bodily redemption for the low low price of a single leap of faith.