The Beginning Of My Journey
T
he journey started simply enough for me. My dad died at Christmas when I was a child. So in the bleak midwinter of my childhood, I faced abandonment. I also went to church because I was sent there. I was a compliant child so I did what I was told. It was there, in that beautiful place, amidst stained glass windows, and the dazzling light of the early morning hours that I prayed “Our Father who art in Heaven”. I looked high into the clerestory of that church’s vaulted ceiling and saw beautiful art, but I did not see God, and worse still I did not see my dad.
Who Is Heaven For?
In the long hours of the night, I wondered about God and my dad. Religious people said my dad couldn’t go to heaven because he didn’t go to church and didn’t use the name “Jesus” except when he lost a bet at Suffolk Downs which he often did. There was a divorce for my mom and dad.
And so I wondered long into the night about whether my dad could go to heaven.
A Message Of Love
Then one day on the way home from church, I “heard” something speaking in my heart. There were no voices, I hasten to add, just a “sense” beating in my heart and it seemed to say; Don’t you know there’s a special place in my love for your dad?
Since that moment I’ve made it my life’s work to tell as many people as would like to hear it…that there’s room in God’s heart for the love of you too…you may be rich or poor, black or white, male or female, gay or straight, Italian, Irish, Jew or Arab…God loves us all…and that’s my simple work…telling that news for as long as there is any breath left in me.