Perry L. Gardner: Private Journal #20
Wednesday, October 12, 1988
Two things come to mind: the Lord’s Prayer, and the First Congregational Church in Meriden.
When I was going on five years old, I went from my mother’s house to live with my grandparents. My grandmother took upon herself my early religious instruction of learning the Lord’s Prayer in the “forgive us our trespasses” version. (It wasn’t until many years later that I found some people use the word “debtors”). So this prayer I learned by heart, and said it quietly to myself when I went to bed each night. It had a very strong hold on me, and I dared not go to bed without saying it. I suppose I felt I had done my duty to God if I did so and felt all would be well as a result. I kept this ritual up for almost 40 years, through childhood and the college years, the Army years, and well into my adult life. I didn’t think that much about what I was doing, but just did it.
My Aunt Esther took me to the Congregational Church Sunday School every Sunday in the early years—she was the only one in the family who went to church religiously. (She was a third occupant in my Grandfather’s household, and I was the fourth). In the Sunday School, I remember a bright sunny room where we learned about a baby Jesus, and mangers, and wise men out of the East, and things like that. I don’t remember much else—no devils, no memories of Old Testament stuff—there must have been some—and there must have been some Good Friday and Easter Resurrection. I don’t remember, except that I do seem to be aware of most Bible stories, and that is where I would have been exposed to them.
I don’t associate all this with a religious experience, but it must have been. The church was a fancy one with marble pillars inside. The family had its own wooden pew where we sat, bored through services I didn’t really understand. Going to church was something good people did, and I did it dutifully and felt good that I had done it, but I don’t even remember seeing God there.
Comfort.