Finitude

An Introduction

I have written and shared many thoughts online over the years. It is strange to think that things I wrote, pieces of who I once was, exist in the ether - some dating back over twenty years. The vast majority of that writing was very personal and very public. I intend for this to still be personal, but not very public. I’m sure it wouldn’t be hard to figure out who I am, but all that would give you is a name. I, myself, would like to figure out who I am. I think it best to allow myself some space and anonymity for that pursuit - as a new friend said it - “to find what is worthy of my finitude.”

I wrote for years on another social media platform, mostly religious thoughts. One of the difficulties in writing for that audience was that it ranged so widely. Some shared my particular religious subculture who knew all the shibboleths and nuances of my writing instinctively. Others, to put it gently, identified very strongly as Christian, but their knowledge was generally of cultural Christianity and often not even accurate. Thus I had to walk a very fine line between saying the deep things I wanted to say while also not alienating either those who were true outsiders or those who didn’t understand quite as much as they thought they did. I was never strongly lower-case-e evangelical, but I always felt an obligation to write in such a way that I didn’t push anyone away by implying they couldn’t be part of the conversation. Here, I would like to free myself from that limitation.

I have been off of social media for almost a full year now. One of the reasons was I wanted to make myself a little difficult to find. Almost five years ago before Covid-19, I was asked to lead a parachurch ministry event. This event should have happened shortly after I was asked to lead, but the pandemic delayed our event. In that time, a lot changed about our world, about myself. One of, if not the defining moments of that process came before it ever started.

Someone from the ministry team who I considered a good friend asked me if I meant the things I’d said politically on social media. I asked for specifics and said, truthfully, “I write a lot. I don’t know which thing(s) you’re referring to.” I was given a list of uncharitable accusations and distortions of things I had written. I attempted to clarify where appropriate - and to mention that beyond any of this, none of it had to do with our ministry or my leading it. I was told in no uncertain terms that if I would not apologize and disavow everything, essentially if I wouldn’t kiss Trump’s ring, that he wouldn’t be volunteering so long as I was involved. I told him that said a lot more about his beliefs than it did about mine.

This experience, along with a few others over the last year led me to a place of deep disappointment. I have rarely seriously doubted my faith, but I have deeply questioned whether I fit in any institutional form of it. Several churches have made it quite clear I was not welcome. But it was these most recent disappointments that pushed me into isolation. And it has been in turning that isolation into solitude that I am finding healing.

I have gone hiking on and off since I could drive, but got pretty serious about it after these events. I wanted to be alone. I wanted to have space to think. I wanted to hide. I wanted to see if anyone would even notice I was gone. I wanted to figure myself out. I wanted to get healthy. I wanted to get away from the stress of work. I wanted to prove I could do something difficult. I wanted to feel a little rugged, a little manly. But mostly, as my friend gave me words for it, I wanted to determine what was worthy of my finitude.

That’s what I want to write about here. I almost always hike alone, or with my dog. But you can join me. I’m learning to come back out of the woods and be around people again.