A memory.
A lot of Swedish middle-class kids get sent to confirmation camp when they're 14. It's basically a crash course in Christianity and ends with first communion. My brother went through his course and then refused the wafer & wine. This actually endeared him to the priest, as it showed him to have taken the issue seriously.
But I went through with it all. I was basically agnostic at the time, but one of the camp counselors imparted a piece of non-standard theology that tipped the scales for me. His name was Roland, and he said "It's the world's best deal. Accept communion and get saved. You don't have to believe." I've got to hand it to the guy, he was really pushing an all-benevolent god.
But in retrospective, I've been wondering about other non-standard aspects to Roland. Frankly, he seemed weird. Bushy-bearded and bespectacled, in an old Nazareth tee-shirt, he had an obtuse air of social ineptitude. Speaking in a monotone, he didn't quite seem to know when to laugh or how to interact. He must have been about 30, but the priest who headed the camp appeared to keep an eye on him as if he weren't quite grown up. Once, after a lesson where I had been my usual talkative self, Roland came up to me and suggested that he and I might continue the discussion on our own. Feeling uncomfortable, I excused myself and ran off with the other kids.
This may just be my imagination. I know nothing about Roland apart from what I saw that week or two in 1986. Maybe he was just a nerdy Christian guy who really liked to talk about religion. Maybe he felt that it was his job to talk to us kids about God. But I remember the priest's vaguely watchful demeanour around Roland. And I wonder if he should really have been a teen camp counselor.
[More blog entries about teens, camp, christianity; tonåringar, konfirmationsläger, kristendom.]
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re. "the world's best deal": this is more-or-less Pascal's Wager (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascals_wager). One of the problems with it is that assumes that Christianity is the only choice of religion. Maybe Odin (or Baal, or The Rainbow Serpent) would prefer you did nothing than dedicating yourself to the competition.
Mike, It is indeed Pascal's Wager, except that it's even better as it doesn't require you to believe in anything. Nothing precludes Martin from being saved by communion cannibalism AND covering his bases by, for instance, converting to Islam.
Besides, Odin, as far as I'm aware, really couldn't care less if Martin was christian or not - all that matters is that you die bravely in battle and you'll probably get to go to Valhalla. Everyone else goes to Hel automatically, regardless of how many people they hanged to appease the gods. Speaking of Hel and Ragnarök, I must admit that the idea of a ship built of nails manned by zombies always tickled my imagination.
By the way, Martin, have you seen this?
http://www.human-race.net/video/humkonfa/humkonfa.htm
Martin! First of all, I wanted to say that I find your blog fun and informative. Being myself a catholic -not a very good one, I must admit- when I read your post I instantly recalled many similar anecdotes by many people. There are weird people everywhere.
Of course, I completely disagree with that notion of religion as a deal. I ownder what the priest in charge of the camp may have said if he heard that idea. Anyway, it shows how a perception of a member of a community can affect the opinion on certain knowledge, in this case, religion.
Perhaps I was fortunate to meet in my formative years with priests and friends who were very articulate and intelligent and this has given me reasons to believe. Anyway, I have experienced too certain repulsion to some members of my religion, but I see that I should look less at the people and pay more attention to the central ideas on which the religion is based. Unfortunately it's not always possible and I still detest certain deranged priest who once charged against children, because they are ignorant. Anyway, he doesn't represent what I truly believe, and one priest doesn't make a church!
Au revoir from Argentina
D.
Confirmation camp was pretty much out of the question for me. I believe my parents asked me if I wanted to go, I said I didn't, and that was the end of it. I'm a bit surprised that Martin went through with it, but then, again, he is a man in whom middle-classness runs deep, to paraphrase The Big Lebowski.
I remember, though, quite a few of my classmates attending church services and the works in order to get a lot of presents on "graduation day". May their blasphemous souls be perpetually scorched in eternal hellfire.
And here is anoher atheist who was confirmed as a youth (all the girls did it...). What tipped the balance for me, apart from the horror of diverging from the right-wing, synth-loving, upper middle-calss normalcy of my class in yet another blatant way, was the priet. A 40 something mother of three with henna colored hair and a black leather jacket. Who was funny, up front, enthusiastic and pedagogical.
Well, you can't say I didn't try it before I knocked it at least.
It was the chocolate eggs for me. The catholic kids got eggs and the other kids didn't. Clever Catholics I suppose. But if you felt odd about that guy you were probably right.
I guess I was lucky that my camp counselor didn't offer me any chocolate eggs. (-;
Or chocolate salty balls?