Church and Liam

So I've been fighting this battle with myself all summer. Between being sick with the sinus infection, then the boys being sick and the house renovations going on, then me getting sick again (or actually, still being sick) our church attendance has been sporadic. But that's not to say that my relationship with God has suffered. If anything, lately, my faith in what I believe and why has only grown stronger. Maybe because I'm not surrounded by spirituality 24/7 and when I think about what I believe, I actually have to think about it. In that regard, my faith and my beliefs have grown much stronger over the last few months.

Also? I know that the situation with Liam and his Autistic/Asperger's diagnoses hanging over our heads as a possibility has affected my faith as well. I've had to face that fact that Liam isn't sick or disabled. He is exactly who and what God made him to be. I cannot and will not "fix" that. And? I am terrified by the fact that God thinks I'm capable of being the mother that Liam needs. I'm awed by that, and honored. But still terrified. That kind of realization puts my faith into a whole new realm for me. It's more mature than anything else. And I've hit the first test of my new found maturity and strength of faith.

Liam, with his issues, is totally literal. He doesn't "get" jokes often times, and sarcasm is lost on him. It's a symptom of his condition. He is also very much driven by rules. How things are supposed to be done. It's just the way his brain works. We've seen this start to affect him more lately because I've realized over the past week or so that though he was in the highest reading group in kindergarten this past year? He can't read. Or he can't read as well as we all thought he could. He compensates. He takes the context into account and guesses. He looks for visual clues, which in kindergarten isn't hard because when you read the word "ball" there is more times than not a picture of a freakin ball next to it. So I started chatting with Liam and trying to figure out how we can help him out. This is what I found out.

My little rule-oriented child? Is confused by the English language. He gets some of it - sometimes "C sounds like K" and such. But then he wants to know how do you know a letter is silent, or why you don't pronounce the "gh" in "thought" or "through" and so on. He is logical and basically? The English language is not logical a lot of times. So why do I bring this up in a conversation about faith and church?

This is why. Because the same logic that confuses Liam when he tackles the written word? Also confuses him at church. The lady at "Maryland Grandma's" church said that you have to say a prayer so you go to heaven because bad people go to the hell (for some reason, Liam calls it "the hell"). And Liam, being the smart boy he is, knows that he occassionally does something wrong and therefore assumes he is "bad". How do I kow this? Because I am the one that had to comfort my sobbing child as he desperately told me that he "had to say the prayer or else he would go to the hell because they said so at Grandma's church". He had to say the prayer. Had to "say the words, Mommy!". That? Is not faith. That is fear. And I tried to explain it to him. That he's not expected to be perfect and grace and everything. He's six and I know some kids get it by that age. But he's wired differently. And he doesn't "get" faith. It's not logical, it isn't rule oriented. It makes no sense to him. But? God sending him to the hell scares the crap out of him.

I want Liam to love God. Not be terrified of Him. And faith is not, by any definition, repeating words just to save yourself from hell. So I wrestle with what he can take in and process. Some days, like yesterday, I'll ask what they did in church and he'll say "I don't remember". And he often doesn't. Until a week later and then he'll start a random conversation with me about it. But I'm really trying to catch what he's taking in so I can make sure the "right and wrong" is tempered with grace and faith.

I don't know how much he can understand of what I'm trying to explain. I just don't want him to think he's "said the words" so he's good to go for the rest of his life and miss out on what God truly is. That thought brings me to tears and is the center of most of my prayers for Liam. But like I said at the beginning, I know God made Liam. And I know Liam has a good heart and sweet spirit. God is fair. God loves Liam. And God promises to answer my prayers. So I guess I'll just have to let him work out the details.