Eron got up from the pew, then paused when he noticed that Friday wasn't following him.
"Coming?" he asked.
"I think I might just stay here for awhile," Friday replied.
"Are you okay?" Eron inquired, having noticed how quiet she had been lately.
"I'm, I'm fine," Friday replied. "You go ahead. I'll catch up."
"Okay. If you sure."
"Really. Go."
Reluctantly, Eron left to mingle with friends and family as he was want to do after the Church service.
Before long, Friday was the only one left in the church hall itself - everyone else having gone outside or to the kitchen. Or home. Whichever. She was on her own for sometime before Father Bob sat down beside her. He said nothing, and Friday didn't look at him.
Together they sat in this companionable silence for rather sometime before Father Bob finally spoke:
"Something wrong, daughter?"
Friday burst into tears. It was the first time since her ordeal with Dylan a couple of weeks ago that she had been able to. not that she had been much of a crier to begin with, but that's hardly the point, now is it?
"I nearly died," she wept.
Father Bob put his arm around her shoulders.
"Worse still... I nearly got vamped. I've spent so, so, so, so, so much time fighting them... If I had been vamped, I'd... I'd..."
Another burst of tears flooded out. Father Bob comforted her while she cried herself out.
"How do you know?" Friday asked at last.
"Know what?"
"How do you know this," Friday gestured around the church, "is real? How do you know that there's really a God who loves you and looks out for you and that you'll go to Heaven one day."
"Faith," Father Bob replied, and smiled. "You've been coming here a year and you still didn't know that."
"It doesn't seem like enough. Faith. There's nothing tangible about that."
"Yet faith is more powerful than anything you can hold in your hands. Once you start believing that God really did send his son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins so that we might live and have eternal life, everything falls into place. I won't tell you that life becomes easy - it's not about making life easy at all. It's about knowing that when we stumble we have God there to help us up and point us back to the right path. It's about knowing that when times look tough and you don't know if you'll be able to pay the bills that God is there looking out for you and will help you through those times of need."
"If God cares so much... why would he let us reach rock bottom?"
"Because he loves us."
"Funny way of showing it."
"It's a rather good way of showing it, actually. You see, he doesn't want us to be lazy, complacent people. He want to prosper us, and there are more ways to prosper than just financially. How about characteristcally? Or in family and friends? Intangible things like that which enrich lives more than money ever could. If the Christian life were easy, everyone would be Christians."
Friday snorted.
"But what kind of people would we be? If every whim we had was granted by God? We'd be a slovenly bunch to say the least, and God doesn't like sloth or greed in his people."
"Seven deadly sins?"
"That's a Catholic affectation. All sin is equal in God's eyes. And Christian or not, we're all guilt of committing it. But, we have God's grace to cover us when we fall. Not to be abused in the sense of 'well, I'm going to lie to this person, but then I can ask for forgiveness and it will all be good', but to be given when we truly repent of our misdeeds. Sometimes, we still fall. Sometimes we commit the same sin over and over, and honestly repent each time, and that's fine - at least we're trying to overcome our shortcomings. And it's an ongoing process."
"Yes, but... how do you know you're going to go to Heaven? And you're not going to get vamped or something?"
"Because when you accept Jesus into your life, your name gets written down with indelible ink into his Book. It won't matter if you die tomorrow, you'll still have that reservation for 1 in Heaven."
Friday raised her eyebrows.
"Uh huh."
"Still sceptical?"
"I've been denying anything even remotely supernatural for most of my life, that even though I know it's real in the last few years I still deny stuff. I can't... I hate not having anything I can see and touch and know it's real."
Father Bob reached down to the small shelf in the pew in front and pulled out a Bible.
"There you go," he smiled.
"That's not what I meant."
"I know. But in your hand you are holding the Word of God, written over generations by many different authors. It's His instruction manual."
Friday looked down at it, and all of a sudden a years worth of messages made sense to her.
"How?"
"How what, my daughter?"
"How do you... y'know... become a Christian?"
"You believe that Jesus is your Lord and Saviour, confess your sin and give your life to Him."
"Give my life?"
"I'm not suggesting that you commit suicide. I mean that you choose to use your life to serve His purpose, instead of your own."
"How do I know what -"
"His basic instructions are right in here," Father Bob replied, patting the Bible cover. "And if there is anything else he wants to add specifically, he'll let you know."
"How?"
"You'll know when it happens."
"That's a little vague."
"God speaks to us in different ways. It depends on circumstances, and a lot depends on us."
"Hmph."
"I'm going to give you the truth, my daughter, not neccesarily what you want to hear. That would be doing you a disservice," then Father Bob smiled. "Besides, deception is againstmy religion."
Friday looked up at him, and laughed ruefully.
"Okay," she said finally. "Let's do this."
Later that afternoon when Friday left the church, she left it as the newest member of the Order of Light, and a newborn Christian.