This is the second of three posts in a series. If you haven’t done so already, please read the first part.

Recently I connected being disowned by my father to the story of Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac. This requires a bit of explanation. To me, the book of Genesis is a compound literary document, written by multiple authors (one is called by scholars E, or the Elohist) and grafted together by priestly redactors. (When I first began reading the Bible this way, I felt very subversive and struggled with both fear and guilt in relying on the wisdom of men to understand what was once to me the sacred, inerrant word of God.) While reading Richard Elliot Friedman’s The Bible with Sources Revealed, I chanced upon the following footnote under the story of Abraham’s sacrifice: “It is possible that in the original old Elohist story, Abraham actually carries out the sacrifice of Isaac.” He then lists seven points of supporting evidence and adds, “In light of these factors, it is possible that in the E[lohist] story Abraham sacrifices Isaac, but that later this idea of human sacrifice is repugnant, so [a redactor] added the lines in which Issac is spared and a ram is substituted. (p.65)”

When I read this, I began crying. At first, I didn’t understand why it hit me so hard–this was just fiction, right? The divinely mandated genocides described in other places in the Old Testament made me angry but didn’t affect me viscerally like this did. In retrospect, I think I saw myself on the altar, and my father wielding the knife. No angel had stayed his hand, and the knife moved quickly to sever all connection to his son. I was sacrificed to his pride.

The Church became my new family. I left for my mission in Tokyo about a year after that phone call with my dad. About four months before the end of my mission, my Japanese grandfather, my Ojiichan, passed away. I lived with him for a year as a child and we were very close. I lost the one mortal father-figure who had loved me unconditionally. My mission president gave me permission to attend his funeral. Looking back on my life, it seems that my Ojiichan’s death marks the beginning a long slow process of separation between me and my Heavenly Father.

In the years following my mission, God, who had once been warm and loving (though always strict), grew more cold and distant. As I learned more about the incomprehensible size of the universe, I wondered what kind of intimacy its Creator could have with a little bit of sentient organic material living on a mote of dust in a far corner of His universe. I became a father myself, and watched through the news as children–other fathers’ children, Heavenly Father’s children–were swept away by tidal waves, suffocated in the trunks of cars, died slowly and painfully from cancer or strangled by sexual predators. I wondered, would Heavenly Father bring the knife down on my children as well? Michael Quinn’s existentialist essay in the May 2005 Sunstone issue, “To Whom shall We Go: Historical Patterns of Restoration Believers with Serious Doubts” mirrors many of my fears and doubts beautifully.

During this time of fear and questioning, I wrote a semi-autobiographical story about attending my Grandfather’s funeral, which won the 1999 Brookie and D. K. Brown Fiction short story contest, and was subsequently published in the October 2002 issue of Sunstone. This marked the beginning of my association with Sunstone (which though considered subversive by many members has helped to preserve my activity in the Church). Rereading my story in preparation for this presentation, I realized that I had unwittingly structured my narrative as a series of good-byes to my Grandfather. Writing it was cathartic–almost a spiritual epiphany, and I remember the taste of that sublime experience each time I read it. Looking back, I believe that my life during this period was a long series of goodbyes to Heavenly Father.

At some point, about four or five years ago, I realized that I was an atheist. Instead of feeling shock or dismay, I felt gloriously free! I was free from unnecessary guilt. I was free from the unrealistic demands of a perfectionist Father-God.

This essay concludes with this post.