It's All Religion

Actually, that's the punchline (or chorus as we songwriters call it) of a tune I wrote called the Prophet inspired by Khalil Gibran's book of the same name. What I want to begin talking about here is religion. OK, I could have done better with that... waited until you were halfway through and then sprung it on you, or better still, slipped it in your ears while your mouth was laughing at something almost entirely not on point.
Since I've lost 90% of my audience anyway, I'll continue. Everybody has their story of how they were brought up in this or that church. How they ditched this or that church at first opportunity. My son explained that he ditched the church of his upbringing because he came to the conclusion that "these were not my people". I didn't bother to speculate aloud that we would probably see him and his future wife upon the age in which their future children came home from school with the fear of (a future) hell put in them from the more "enlightened", "religious" children.

I can sum up my early training in a quick paragraph or two, have patience.

My parents were not church-goers, Dad was a non-practicing Irish Catholic, Mother a non-practicing Southern Baptist. For reasons you may already know, they didn't want to become members of any group that would welcome the likes of them (See 1960-1963), if their secret were discovered, they would definitely become persona non grata.
As a young child I was taken to the Baptist church a few times and really liked it. I liked it enough that I would walk myself when no one else would go with me. I thought it was interesting and the people were nice to me... but when I asked questions about the holes in some of the stories, well, they were less nice, and never answered my questions unless you call "you've gotta have faith" an answer.

After my parents became "legit", our family began to attend a Congregational Church in our neighborhood. It was cool in that the Scouts met there (represent!), my parents cultivated a social life, and we got something resembling a religious education without the emphasis on the fantastic tales requiring an absence of critical thinking. A good experience all around.
Until the place imploded.

Internal fighting brought the church to it's knees, and a well established faith community closed it's doors forever.

This is all going somewhere.

'Next church experience was at The Temple of Light (See Mr Psychic). By then I was on staff as a musician and somewhat more into the production, but I enjoyed it on several levels. My favorite religious part is when we said the creed each week. One line was

"We believe in an Infinite Intelligence".

'Got to admit something embarrassing here: I thought the line was "we believe in infinite intelligence. 'More of a human potential take. But I like it as written too; another good name for God.

Since I'm admitting embarrassing things, here's another: I misspelled both "infinite" and "intelligence" when I first wrote it. I am however, infinitely intelligent enough to use spell-check.
'Left the Temple upon relocating to Houston in 1972 and did not attend anywhere until 1979.

OK, this is taking longer than I originally thought.

The Houston Chronicle religion section often had features about some Unitarian minister or lay person, and the articles would whet my curiosity about the Unitarian Church. Not feeling any spiritual vacuum, I wanted to have a look, because "at least we should meet some interesting people".
This was about the time I had begun my apprenticeship as a piano technician. The odds of coming across one of these are 1 to impossible-1. The boss, who was a Church of Christ elder, informed me his family was in church "every time they unlocked the doors", and they strongly recommended their employees do the same. If I did not have a church, he was proud and happy to pick me up and bring me to his. These are near - direct quotes.

We became members of the First Unitarian Church of Houston shortly thereafter. It is pretty simple, about the same as subscribing to a magazine. But not for me. I requested an interview with the minister, Webster Kitchell, and he left a card game on his day off and came to talk to me. What I remember of our visit was:

Webster Kitchell: "Do you believe we are all born with a mountain to climb?"
Me: "yes".
Webster Kitchell: "Do you believe there is more than one way up the mountain?"
Me: "yes".
Webster Kitchell: "You may be a Unitarian Universalist".