Last week, I received the following email from an Evangelical woman named Ronda Cray:
Hi Mr. Bruce,
I read some of your writings today. I also read your warning about not writing you but you also said that you knew I would, Probably because you were a pastor for many years, which by the way, I still hear in your writings today. I understand some of why you chose to leave Christianity, I almost did that myself. I remember putting my Bible in my closet and telling God that He was too hard of a Master. But in time, I realized what Matthew 11:28-29 meant and I have never been the same since. It was the goodness of God that led me back to Him and nothing else. I know God is real and I hope you haven’t made your final decision in throwing the Baby out with the bathwater. You mentioned that you had some health issues and I prayed that you would feel better soon and have a long life.
Psalm 139.
You can read my response to Cray here.
As I typically do for people I publicly respond to, I sent Cray a link to my response to her. She quickly responded to me, ignoring virtually everything I said. Here’s what she had to say:
Good morning Mr. Bruce,
Thank you for your quick response. I just want to let you know that I am praying that you receive your full healing. I only read a few of your writings so I didn’t know how bad your health issues were, but I have no doubt that after your healing is manifested, you will see for yourself that God is real and He is good. 🙂
I also subscribed to your blog today because I expect to see you fully recovered. Hebrews 13:8
Cray wants me to know that she is praying that I will receive “full healing.” Cray knows — because I told her — that gastroparesis and exocrine pancreatic insufficiency are incurable. I wish they weren’t. I wish I didn’t spend hours last night vomiting and shitting — but there’s nothing that can be done. Symptoms can — at times — be managed and even controlled, but there is no cure for these diseases. Further, I have degenerative spine disease. My spine and neck are literally falling apart — leaving me in excruciating pain and debility. No cure for this either. All doctors can do for me is manage my pain. Surgery is out of the question, according to two neurosurgeons. Yet, despite these medical facts, Cray is praying for my full healing. That means no gastroparesis, exocrine pancreatic insufficiency, fibromyalgia, diabetes, high blood pressure, neuropathy, and herniated/deteriorated discs and joints. If only, right?
Cray says that she has “no doubt” that my healing will be manifested, and after it is, I will KNOW that God — Cray’s peculiar version of God, anyway — is real and good. Damn straight, girl! If Cray’s magical deity can totally heal me, I will IMMEDIATELY repent, abandon atheism, and embrace Christianity. I mean this. I will say to the world that J-E-S-U-S miraculously healed me. I will fall on my face and worship him from that day forward. My story will be published worldwide. I will even write a book about what God has done for me, hopefully selling millions of copies. Totally healing me would be right up there with Jesus’ virgin birth and resurrection from the dead. Impossible events, yet they happened anyway, according to Cray. True miracles, right?
Cray subscribed to my posts because she expects to one day read a post from me that says her prayers have been answered; that the thrice holy God has totally, from head to toe, healed me. She is CERTAIN that this will happen!
Cray concludes her email with a Bible quotation: Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever (Hebrews 13:8). I agree. Jesus never healed anyone yesterday, he won’t heal anyone today, and he won’t heal anyone tomorrow. I have no expectations of healing. All I hope for is pain relief and a reduction of my suffering. How can it be otherwise? This is my cross to bear, and I plan to carry it until it kills me. I don’t plan on spending one moment pondering what Jesus might do for me if I will but return to the fold. I first became sick seventeen years before I deconverted. I was a devoted follower of Jesus for most of my life. Yet, I have been struggling with serious health problems since I was thirty-four years old, and haven’t had a disease-free, pain-free day since. I suffered with God, and now I suffer without him. And I am fine with that. Suffering is part of human existence. I cannot escape my lot in life without pulling the proverbial plug. Not today . . .
Jesus, you know where I live. Heal me, and I am yours. If not, fuck off. 🙂
Saved by Reason,
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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yeah, there is that troublesome mustard seeds move mountains challenge. I assume Cray’s faith is strong, real, and certainly at least mustard seed sized. But still things don’t change. I don’t recall a lot of qualifiers on that mustard seed belief either.
And there are always reasons, such as gods timing or answers being no or god having expectations that you wait. Always a explanation, always an excuse for god not to follow through with the son’s promises.
I reckon it’s a parable huh? Not to be taken word for word in the commonly received sense of those words. As a parable I read it to mean a tiny bit of faith, reading “faith” for the purpose of this parable as “hope” or “determination” and “mountains” to mean great big challenging difficult things. Makes some sense thataway.
Yes but this particular statement came from Jesus in response to his disciples inability to heal someone. They were told they failed because they lacked faith and only very very small faith is needed to move mountains. Yet people are not being healed.
Indeed so. My take on it as a parable is in keeping with The Bible as literature rather than as holy writ, as spoken by Jesus himself.
Dear Ms Cray, as you have this huge faith that your fairy in the sky – err, I mean your god – can work miracles for Bruce, just cos you fire regular shrieks at the ceiling for him, I think you must have a very special hotline to him/her/them/ze. So, please, on behalf of all the suffering folk in the world – like those caught up in current war zones – will you ask him, as well as healing Bruce, to create world peace? I mean he’s supposed to be omnipotent isn’t he/she/them/ze? Seems more like ‘conspicuous by his absence’ to my rational mind! I won’t be holding my breath for either miracles of course!
Bless her heart. Maybe she can convince her invisible wizard to manifest its healing powers upon poor Bruce. I won’t hold my breath, but if her invisible wizard thinks her mustard seed sized faith is sufficient, that would be cool. Bruce, can you video the miraculous healing for us and put it on your site for all to see? And show us confirmation from your doctors? Then I’ll convert to whatever invisible wizard religion after seeing the proof.
I, too, would renounce my atheism and join any religion if its deity could cure Bruce—and bring about world peace, end hunger, poverty and violence against women, children , LGBTQIA people and anyone who is considered an “outsider” because of race, ethnicity or immigration status.
Film at 11.
Well Mr. Bruce, that’s what makes us agnostics, huh? We are open to evidence proving us wrong, should it ever appear. That’s the only intellectually correct position since one can’t know what isn’t known yet, and all things, however preposterous, remain within the vaporous realm of possibility. I too would gratefully accept healing if we got it. That’s where we and Ms. Cray differ. We remain open to possibilities while she insists on facts with no evidence. I find her sincerity and good will to be sentimentally appealing if unconvincing. Good intentions as such may not displace even a mustard seed on the other end of the scale but I’ll respect them none the less.
(George Carlin had it right) “You know who I pray to? Joe Pesci. Two reasons: First of all, I think he’s a good actor, okay? To me, that counts. Second, he looks like a guy who can get things done. Joe Pesci doesn’t fuck around. In fact, Joe Pesci came through on a couple of things that God was having trouble with.”
Well, it’s true, George: Jesus likely is the same yesterday, and today, and forever.
Stone dead, and in a Roman mass grave somewhere near Jerusalem, and likely to remain there till the sun engulfs the Earth in 5 billion years or so.
Unless he never existed, in which case he’s still the same as yesterday: Imaginary. At least Joe Pesci is real (and still alive, too!)
My only regret is that people like George Carlin and Christopher Hitchens have left this mortal coil. We need them now more than ever.