I Believe

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith from a place of winter For the Years of Winter…

I listen to music as I walk. One of my favorite walking genres is 1950s pop songs. The songs that used to have “a good beat for dancing” now have a good beat for walking.

One that pops up from time to time is "I Believe," sung by Frankie Laine.

I believe for every drop of rain that falls/ a flower grows/ I believe that somewhere in the darkest night/ A candle glows/ I believe for everyone who goes astray/ Someone will come to show the way/ I believe, I believe.

I believe above the storm the smallest prayer/ Will still be heard/ I believe that someone in the great somewhere/ Hears every word/ Every time I hear a newborn baby cry, Or touch a leaf, or see the sky, Then I know why, I believe.

It was the perfect faith song for the years of Eisenhower, who famously said, “I don’t care what you believe as long as you believe something.” It was an era of faith in faith, belief in belief.

Words and music were by Ervin Drake, Jimmy Shirl, Al Stillman, and Irvin Graham. I’m not sure which ones wrote the lyrics, but if it were me, I’d be claiming I wrote the music.

That song spoke to me, though. I knew I believed something, but I wasn’t sure what it was. It was fun to sing in church, “If you trust and never doubt, He will surely bring you out,” but I had some doubts as well as some faith. I was not sure I could sing the church songs with honesty. Those “I Believe” words about generic faith, along with the sort of mushy generic music we listened to in the dance room [1] at lunchtime, were part of my adolescent world. I could believe that way with honesty.

Through ten years of higher education, I became very sophisticated theologically and musically, at least if you equate cynicism and sarcasm with sophistication. In theology classes we made great fun of popular religious music. “I Come to the Garden Alone,” was called “Andy,” as in “Andy walks with me, Andy talks with me, Andy tells me I am his own.” We also sang, “Buddha loves me, this I know, for the Sutras tell me so,” and, continuing our Buddhist hymnary, “He’s the Lotus of the Valley,” in place of “He’s the Lily of the Valley.” We ridiculed the triumphalism of Earl Marlatt’s “Are Ye Able,” even though it wasn’t technically triumphalist. And, of course, “I Believe” was the worst of all. For us elite types, “simple” was definitely out. I reveled in my ability to say “Buxtehude.”

These days I think that Drake, Shirl, Stillman, and Graham may have been onto something beyond a chance to make a few bucks off of some schlock. I still think they ought to be embarrassed to have their names on those lyrics, but I believe. I believe in mystery. There’s a hell of a lot of stuff I don’t understand. There’s also a heaven of a lot of stuff I don’t understand. When I stand at the pearly gates, St. Peter isn’t going to say, thank God, “Did you pass your theology qualifying exam?” or even, in deference to my status as a sometime blond, “Do you know which book of the Bible comes after I Kings?” When St. Peter starts off with, “Did you believe in…” I’m just going to break in and say, “Yes.”

JRMcF

1] The “dance room” was totally mislabeled, since none of us boys who stood, awkwardly, on our side of the room had the courage or dexterity to walk across to the vastly mysterious other side of the room to ask a girl to dance.

{I also write the fictional “Periwinkle Chronicles” blog. One needs a rather strange sense of humor to enjoy it, but occasionally it is slightly funny. It is at http://periwinklechronicles.blogspot.com/}

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