Blame My Father, Not The Devil
How my religious father made me depart from the Lord’s way
“Every satanic coven in this environment, catch fire!” I mutter absentmindedly, repeating after my mom. She had just called a prayer point and shook her head vehemently, praying like she was on a battlefield. The prayer had been on for more than an hour.
Sitting adjacent to her, my eyes focused on the wall clock opposite me: tick tock, tick tock. I couldn’t wait for the prayers to end. Burning irritation hissed through my body like deathly poison as I felt livid for wasting an hour, which I could have used for productive activity. I didn’t always dislike religiousness, though.
As the first child who was the only child in a religious home for many years, my parents did a great job in imparting core religious beliefs. From mandating me to always go to Sunday School and leave for the church as early as 6 am to making all mid-week services compulsory, Mr & Mrs. Ajayi did their best to ensure their seed never departed from the way of the Lord. And they succeeded… at least at first.
When my parents began to attend a pentecostal church hell-bent on spiritualizing everything, their spiritualism, especially my dad’s, skyrocketed. In a nutshell, they became fanatics. Almost everyone became witches and wizards overnight, leading them to stop attending family functions. Lest evil people touch their children and “destroy their glory.”
My mom’s fashion sense deteriorated drastically too. She stopped wearing jewelry and trousers, based on the belief that women who wore these will land in hellfire. My dad also began to feel uncomfortable seeing women wear trousers. For the women in his circle, virtually all his meetings with them became mini evangelism. Due to how my parents could do no wrong in my eyes, I accepted these beliefs hook, line, and sinker.
As early as age 12, I had read the entire bible. By age 13, I had begun to evangelize, especially to women. The core of my preachings to these women was that they stopped wearing trousers and adorning themselves with jewelry, using Deuteronomy 22:25 and 1 Peter 3:3 as a backup.
After some time, I joined the choir. Rehearsals became a major part of my life. As if this isn’t enough, there was a dry fasting and deliverance session every first Friday of the month for the choir, which I had to attend as well. Although these left me almost time for any other activities, safe reading and schooling, I enjoyed them regardless.
Slowly, I began to gasp for air. My life felt suffocating. Church consumed my time. There was no sparing at the homefront either as I spent most times praying more than Elijah probably did. The result of these was a nuance in my school life.
In school, I was a socialite. I knew all the trends and even had a girlfriend. I also explored my rapping talent, going ahead to record a studio single with my best friend. My life seemed like Bruce Wayne’s. The only difference is, I was a good boy in church/home and a bad boy in school. Notwithstanding the conflicting image, I still believed in the rightness of my parents’ beliefs.
With time, my self-awareness heightened, and the flaws in my parents and the church began to unblur. It seemed like these problems had always existed, but I was too naive to pinpoint them previously.
I had also started reading books such as Thinking, fast and slow by Daniel Kahneman and You Are Not So Smart by David McRaney. With the gained knowledge from them, I began to question my inherited belief system and values. I started to ask, “why?” more. My parents didn’t notice this, though, as I never questioned them openly. It was mostly self-talk.
The more I read, the more it all started losing its coherence — religion.
The doctrines began to look more misogynistic than holy.
I began to view the obsession with evil spiritual forces as the consequence of having a victim mindset and not always wanting to take responsibility for one’s actions.
I began to view the obsession with evil spiritual forces as the consequence of having a victim mindset.
I began to see religion as opium used by people to give themselves hope, the sigh of the oppressed.
By the time I completed high school, I had had an orientation change. Before my high school graduation, I left the choir as it no longer brought me joy. I stopped attending the mid-week services too. I used my final exams as the reason behind this, though. I wasn’t bold enough to own my change.
Getting out of my parents’ roof, however, gave me the needed confidence. Luckily, I also got to secure my financial independence as I got introduced to freelancing soon after leaving their house. I became more independent and critical in thinking. I again turned to an unapologetic liberal supporting LGBT, feminism, abortion, and other policies I had always considered ‘sin’ all my life.
When I returned home for a break, the atmosphere was different. We had moved from our previous apartment. And so, it was effortless for me to detach myself from the religious scene. I stuck to my new routine of attending churches just on Sundays.
I also started to question my parents’ beliefs, pointed out their flaws whenever they tried to be ‘holier-than-thou’ and argued where necessary. My elongated stay with them due to COVID-19 made them recognize the extent of my vicissitude.
Although my dad has been dramatic about this, explaining how I have become worldly and lost interest in the things of God, my mom is surprisingly chilled. But I find this ironic because it’s my dad, not my mom, who caused me to depart from the way of the Lord. If he didn’t purchase over a thousand books and mandated me always to stay indoors, perhaps I wouldn’t have read books that taught me to question and challenge norms. Maybe, I would still be a religious fanatic and not the open-minded young man that I am.
So, blame my dad, not the devil. For it’s his doings that led me astray.
