Eight or nine years ago, during my darkest winter, I went regularly to visit Steve, a fiercely religious pastor in a country Presbyterian Church. Steve always told me he was a Jesus man, and he was quite open about hoping I would embrace Christ as my Lord and Savior and keep myself out of Hell.

But he was always drawn to rescue, he took me  in like a stray dog wandering in the cold, offering me tea and peanuts when we met, sometimes in  his kitchen, sometimes in his big old drafty Church. He even invited me to his weekly farmer’s lunch. I loved going.

Steve was, as he put it a “Jesus man,” he was also a very good friend to me and a minister of compassion, when I would come to him in panic and pain, he always invited me in, we would talk together and pray together. Steve was – is – the real deal and I will always be grateful for the refuge and comfort he gave me.

We argued a lot. Steve was opposed to divorce, and also sex out of marriage. I was in the process getting divorced, and determined to have sex often. He said he had to try.

He also said I was a good Christian in many ways, better than many of the churchgoers that he tended to.

We were curious friends, but the friendship seemed deep and valuable to me. I think I have always been drawn to friends who are  not like me.

When I got married and moved to Cambridge, we drifted apart.

I was no longer living in a panic, and Steve had souls to save. He often told me that we were all sinners awaiting salvation. The Presbyterians around here are tough and they are not kidding.

Sometimes I would invite Steve along on my hospice runs, especially if people wanted to be baptized as they approached the end of their lives. Steve would come and question the seekers closely about their faith, if he didn’t hear real conviction, or were just looking to be safe, he would politely decline the baptism and recommend someone else.

Steve told me once that the strength and conviction I was looking for was inside of me, and could not be found outside.

He said the answers I was looking for could never come until I was able to live from my center, and not from my head, or the beliefs of other people. For all of his fundamentalism, he talked often of the new spirituality – mediation, solitude, Zen, even Yoga.

He told me he was convinced that I was profoundly sincere in seeking to live a spiritual life. He told me that I would come soon to discover my own idea of God, and he even blessed that journey in a prayer we said together in his office one winter morning when I felt I just could not get through another day.

He asked me to remember that God was a gentle breeze by which he would make his presence known to me, and that I would feel this in my center, not my head.

I’m still looking for God, but I have found many gentle breezes, they always seem holy to me. The recent troubles and tensions in our country have inspired me to embrace a spiritual life, one it seems that will always be outside of an organized faith or religion.

The best response to discord and controversy is to ignore it, and go to the center, and live a good life.

I envy Steve his absolute conviction, I am a creature of grays and hues, I always look to step in the shoes of others. In the past two years, I have turned inward to the call of an inner life  during a time in which social problems are so pressing.

This is not political work for me, I have absolutely no interest in politics as it is practiced in our country now.

I seek to relate to myself and others in a creative way and to live from the center of my existence. I hope to be a gentle breeze that can touch and help others.

I think of Steve often, and of the great gift he gave me that I use almost  every day now. He called me to guide myself and hopefully some others to go beyond myself in a  search for meaning without losing my own home.

More than anything else, this means not being distracted by the trivia of argument and judgement and hate and  frustration. Easier said than done. I’m on it, though.