What do you believe?

The baby was due in a few days, but the baby was breech. Complications abounded and desperation pushed the parents to prayer. After begging his ancestors to save his wife and child, Papa got a revelation in a dream later that night. In the dream, one of his ancestors told him to wake up and visit a lady in a nearby village. The lady would prepare medicinal herbs to fix the breech birth and ensure a healthy delivery. Papa obliged. As soon as the intrusive light of dawn hit Papa's skin, he rose and went to meet the lady in the village. The village lady shared the herbs and Papa gave the herbs to his ailing wife. Papa's wife gave birth to a healthy child. The answered prayer validated Papa's faith.

What do you believe?

Faith is a tricky topic for me. I am a Christian who has had my fair share of crises of faith. I have always been apprehensive about evangelism because of my interactions with people from different cultures. Sometimes, I don't think Jesus is what people need. And, I believe the best evangelism is to be a good person. People remember how you treat them and how you make them feel. If you stir up their powerful positive emotions, they'll likely attend your fellowship on Wednesday night.

Papa is a Cameroonian friend of mine who is several years older than me. Ours is one of those friendships made late in life that rise above dwindling social skills, paranoia, rigidity, and social anxiety—the bedfellows of aging. These friendships shock you because you're not ready for them. You don't rehearse. You don't posture. They just click.

At a dinner on the eve of Papa's departure from Uganda, a mutual friend's mention of Papa's "peculiar" beliefs piqued my interest. I love hearing people talk about what they believe. And I don't mean the rote regurgitation of biblical text. No, I mean the story that made them believe. The other people in the room were already giggling and making snarky remarks, so I knew this story was good. Putting up minimal resistance, Papa indulged me...

In Papa's tribe, when the patriarch dies, the family buries the patriarch in their ancestral home. Okay, normal. So far so good. Wait for it. After a year, the family prunes the patriarch's skull from the rest of the bones and places the skull in a hut in the homestead. There it is! I repeat: the family prunes the patriarch's skull from the rest of their body and places the skull in a hut in the homestead.

If Papa's family has been faithful to this tradition for generations, the hut could be brimming with skulls and that sight is either terrifying or fascinating to you. I think it's fascinating. I think it is only slightly different from a museum, with several relics one has deep familial connections with. Imagine seeing the skulls of men in your family from hundreds of years ago. WOW!

When family members encounter challenges in their lives, they visit the "beskulled" hut and pray to their ancestors for guidance. Papa added that besides the story about his child's pre-birth complications, he had at least 3 other examples of the miraculous benefits of his consultation with his ancestors. How can you argue with that? My parents once told me that when I was a child, a lump near the lymph nodes in my neck that required surgery miraculously disappeared after their prayers. My parents said the doctors were just as surprised as they were. How can you argue with that?

I shared Papa's story with my family and my pious sister called it necromancy. Technically, she was not wrong. But, why are we Christians so arrogant about our faith? Why do we think we have a monopoly on heaven and the afterlife? A Mormon friend I used to work with once told me that even in death—in purgatory—Mormon priests would be there to give the soul one last chance to win salvation. I laughed so hard when he told me this. I always assumed death was the great equalizer. When the lights finally went out, we would [finally] know the truth. 49 virgins? Streets of gold and everlasting joy? Reincarnation into raccoons? Death would teach us all. If there are more door-to-door visits from spiritual Jehovah's witnesses, ambulating on bicycles in the afterlife, then I'm afraid the confusion will go right down to the wire. Forever.

What do you believe?

I don't mean to spark religious debate. Rather, I want to challenge your beliefs and encourage you to be more open-minded. Papa listens to the condescending ridicule from Christians and then observes millions of Christians lining up to buy "holy rice" from a pastor. However, Papa doesn't think those Christians are stupid. He doesn't judge them. Papa is familiar with the extent desperation can push the human spirit. He is familiar with damned dreams and answered asks. My atheist brother, Yücel, who I mentioned in this article, told me the worst travesties he encountered in his life were committed by Christians. Christians claiming to act at the behest of the Almighty.

I wish we all rooted our religion in basic human decency and practiced the good things our big books teach us. You can't build a career by stealing from the poor, then despising poor people, insist your children "marry well" —along tribal, racial, or income lines—and then give us a puffy speech at your daughter's wedding about how everything is possible with God.

The best form of evangelism is to be a good person. What do you believe? And are you practicing it every day?

Have a good week and be kind to those around you ✌🏾