To the Lord, a letter

Dear Lord,

Thanks for everything in my life. I pray that you'll help me now, I'm really confused. What is the divide between Methodists and the Catholics and all the rest? Why can't we embrace the same things like rosaries and pilgrimages? You know I'm a Methodist in a catholic school, am I allowed to use the rosary for my own meditation? I still have the pale pink rosary from primary school bought at age seven or eight and kept in my room since then.

59 pale pink beads with a middle section bearing the words Jubilaeum and A.D 2000 with symbols, then the crucifix. You knew I was going to buy it but why. My literature teacher sending me an sms to join mass on Friday morning. My history teacher sharing with us her experience at 12 years old at Lourdes in France. They keep turning unresolved in my head today, on Sunday during daylight hours. Now I think of myself in those cathedrals in France again. Within Notre Dame's stone walls with the religious Catholic culture all around. The lighting of the candles and the stall selling rosaries and religious items.

I was maintaining silence then, at 10 years old, trusting myself and you completely that I was in the right place. No contradicting beliefs or churches in my way down the inner dimmed light of Notre Dame. I bought a cross pendant, a plain metal one at the cathedral upon the hill on the other side of the river and watched as the metal peeled off the surface back in my homeland.

I saw Notre Dame again this June, only I was outside looking in. I spent only a few minutes savouring its frontal Gothic design and the next hours till four painting its back view with my art class. We did not enter the place said to hold your crown of thorns and a piece of the actual cross you carried. Now, on the second last day of June, I have no idea what is the difference.

Lord, can I speak or whisper a prayer to you and Mary with my pale pink rosary or must I pray with my hands clasped as I have done my whole life given to me by you. You gave me and are continuing to give me a blessed life. A stable environment, accountable friends and sisters in Christ. A rosary aged eight years old on my table. Family. Your son who died on the cross of pain. A guiding light following me and who inclined me out of no other reason than to glorify your name in praise. Yet I can't really consecrate my whole life to you, I don't know if I will know when I really allow you to take full control. i stand in the Catholic place of prayer and worship in my school and offer the sign of peace as a handshake while my friends embrace each other. I see the metal rosaries hanging in the corner and I don't know what they mean. The net can only tell me so much.

Today I saw a pendant with the crucifix. It was small and something I think I was looking for. I tried to buy it with the coins left over from today's offering, I only had ten cents more than required. The cashier wouldn't accept the 5 cent coins I had. My mom offered to pay and I just told her I decided against it. She did buy it but when she asked me what I was going to do with it I said it was for me. She said but are we supposed to wear it. I said that's why I said I decided against it. My mother is Methodist, my father is Methodist. All three of us not technically born into a family where both parents were Christians. At least in my case.

Tomorrow I will go for the morning prayer, as a Methodist, and bring my pale pink rosary. I'll ask my Catholic sister in Christ what is the meaning of the rosary. If possible I'll ask my literature teacher if Methodists can use the rosary. If it doesn't work tomorrow I'll try again the day after and the day after that. I'm scared to ask my Methodist church community. This is the first time the marks of my church and school have hurt. Was it stated that the better option was for me to go to the Methodist school instead. Then why am I here. I dare not tell anyone from my church except you, the head of Christianity in all its forms.

I'll pray tonight as my heart is praying now in this message. Only the web world won't have access to that prayer. Just me and you with you knowing everything yet wanting me to tell you everything and with me knowing you are there. My eyes feel a little wet again.

Praise the Lord God, Creator of Heaven and Earth.

Amen.