The Word

In the beginning, there was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. John 1:1*

If you sort of ignore the actual intention of the quote and take it literally, man, that’s a sexy egotistical concept for even the most humble wordsmith.

I’ll say it, I’m a devotee of the Word.**

I have hymnals floating all over my house. Bird by Bird is sitting in my bathroom right now. Two copies of On Writing float around the house, though both are right now in my dining room. I have books on structure and genre piled up next to my bed and there are more then a few editing books in my living room. I go to these books when I want to revel in my faith, but I also go to them when I find I have a crisis of faith. Picking up a good one, flipping through for inspiration, generally fills me with fervor and suddenly I want to get back to practicing my faith.

I’m not clergy, though, I spread the faith casually, I have neither the vision nor the dedication to teach The Word to others. I have to live with it, practice my religion in the real world outside of the safety of many churches devoted to The Word. I envy clergy their solitude to contemplate The Word, but I guess if none of us were laity, there wouldn’t be much of a faith to discuss. I honor the men and women who devote their time to the Word as an idea and something to study, but I’m not smart enough to do much more with it then live it.

But this isn’t some hippy religion with guitars and a lot of forgiveness. As far as I know, confession exists, but it’s generally something you can only do if you aren’t successful and even there, there isn’t really anyone to absolve you.

To add it it’s cult-like mystique, it’s usually something no one practices in public. You can’t go to an open service on Sunday or see us spreading the Word in a public park on at an airport. Sure, you’ll see the rare anarchist sitting in a coffee shop with their alter pieces; laptop and moleskin notebook and hymnal. Sometimes they’re actually practicing, but more often then not it’s just set dressing to control how people judge them. “Oh, they must be Wordists, you can tell by the props they carry. They must be really faithful. Look at all their stuff.”

I admit, I am sometime guilty of putting the alter pieces before the worship and get so lost in the rituals, (I must have silence or the right music or the right candles,) that I neglect the Word. Here, I’m confessing.

Anyway… We don’t often do it in public. We tend to have to do it in dark places, under rocks and in closets and away from eyes that judge. It often alienates us from people who don’t understand the Word the way we do. Hell, it tends to isolate us from each other. Almost like and anticult. We have to form elaborate excuses to gather in hotels or convention centers or coffee shops or online on forums just so we feel a little bit less alone, and yet service to the Word is still done so inside the self that it has to be done in private.

And of course, no one worships the Word right so far as anyone is concerned. When my worship is done, the first thing I want is to find other worshipers to tell me what I did wrong. Like the  gathers, we construct elaborate ritual around critiquing the way others celebrate the Word and what they did wrong and right. Sometimes we gather around the works of Worshipers long dead to decide if their work is still relevant or how it’s so much better then anything out today.

Plus there’s the blood sacrifice.

No, really. Sometimes you’ll be in worship, have say, 10,000 words down of a 60,000 word novel when the Word speaks to you and you realize that about, say, 5,000 of those words don’t actually fit in this novel and without them another 3,000 don’t work so I’m pretty much going to have to start over.

So, I’m cutting and hacking and bleeding all over and the Word is appeased. Hemorrhaging word count on the alter is sometimes the only way to reconnect with the Word, and that’s why so few people really stick with the church for long. I don’t have a problem with those who lapse, they’re probably smarter then me, less brainwashed by their faith. I almost envy them too.

I’ve probably stretched the metaphor, but since my form of confession is a one way street anyway, I’ll just have to live with that.

*You know who’s fantastic? Cherie Priest. You know why? Apparently, she has that phrase it Greek tattooed on her lower back. I love her so very much!

**Not to be confused with any actual religious figures, spirits or ideas. The faith represented here is purely fictitious. Probably. Unless you want to give me money.