Could it really be that simple?

I was raised Catholic. My mother was a staunch Catholic; my father a Protestant. Needless to say as was the "rule," my father had to agree, before he married my mother, to raise any children from the marriage in the Catholic church. So we grew up Catholic. I even spent several miserable years in Catholic school, which did little but heighten my distrust of that institution.

About once a year my mom would let dad take me to his Lutheran church and I enjoyed it a lot more, probably because people were so friendly and always made a big fuss over me.

I stopped attending church as soon as I had the option, although I've had flirts with returning, once when I was in college and once back to Unity church, which I really did enjoy. One of the reasons I liked Unity was because the kids always came in from Sunday school during the service and the minister would ask them what they'd learned. One morning, he stuck a microphone in one small kid's face and said "So did you have fun this morning?"

The kid thought for a minute and said "Well, I had fun, but not a lot of fun!" He could have taken the words right out of my mouth. I go to church because it's a duty, not because I enjoy it. The body is willing but the spirit is weak.

Now, because my boyfriend is active in his church, I attend with him. His church is a non-demoninational Christian church and the minister, about to retire, has been there forty years. While I can't say I enjoy going, I seem to always hear something that applies to me.

I, and many of my Fellowship friends, I think, find our God in meetings and in solitude. To me, Sunday mornings would be best spent riding my bike on Missouri's beautiful Katy Trail, snaking along the Missouri River, where the blue indigo buntings flit beside you and the squirrels delight, like the Geico commercial, in running out in front of your bike in Kamakazi death dives, hoping to flip you over the handlebars. That, in the joy of the ride, in the music I listen to on my ride there to the trail, that's where I find God.

Yesterday was Father's Day, so my boyfriend's daughter came in from St. Louis and we and his parents, two great 76-year old Show-Me natives, attended church. The topic was life's storms, and the message asked how we weather life's storms. I enjoyed the message, but as usual, it was the music that got my attention.

One of the lyrics from a song said something like "Ask God to change your heart." Could it really be that simple? When I'm struggling, as I've continued to do these last weeks, can a simple request to God to "change my heart" make a difference. Because it normally is the heart that is in error when I'm uncomfortable. My heart is usually judging people, places or things and none are living up to my expectations.

I heard a guy say in a meeting awhile ago that as a rule, everyone is doing the very best he or she can. And as a rule, it will never be good enough for me. How true for me.

And I know that in some way, the people who are judging me, at least I feel they are, are people I have somehow harmed, or they perceive that I have. I saw yesterday in the Bible that the word "harm" comes from the Greek word "hubris." Hubris, of course, means "excessive pride, arrogance." Yes, I've been accused of that a time or two. Aren't many of us egomaniacs with inferiority complexes?

As my sponsor has told me about this particular situation I've been in for awhile with some of my fellow members, all I can do is a tenth step. I've tried to clean up my side of the street--now it's up to them to either accept the amends or not.

In the meanwhile, I have a new tool. I can ask God to change my heart.