On Good Friday late afternoon, my family and I traipsed over to our church for a “prayer walk.” We herded our three kids through a series of rooms dimly lit with images and crosses and candles, as we attemped to remember the darkness of that day. Our kids are 11, 8, and 6.

One of the last stations was our semi-darkened and empty sanctuary, where we sat near the front watching PowerPoint slides of the Passion of the Christ. The slideshow was on a loop and set at several-second intervals.

One slide looked to be a pencil sketch of the crucifixion, with Jesus outstretched on the cross. Right before the slide appeared, my oldest had asked me a historical question related to the Passion, and it led to a wonderful teaching moment. We whispered back and forth for a minute or so. But then the slide appeared, and Christian said, abruptly, “He had a nice six-pack.”

Christian was referring to Jesus, of course. The six-pack was Jesus’ tight abs, as rendered by the artist.

I couldn’t muffle my giggle, his comment so random, outrageous, pre-adolescent.

To the wonderful pre-pubescent and adolescent mind, everything is about me, myself, my self. There is no “other,” there is nothing that is “not me.” Everything is part of me and about me. I see Jesus on the cross and his body and his abs, and then ruminate on my abs and think it would cool to have abs like his.

The same is true of the adolescent spiritual self, which much of modern religion, especially that of many suburban churches, tends to perpetuate. Everything is about me. My heroism to save the world. My attempts to keep promises for God. My personal spiritual journey.

My sense is that we all struggle to break through the adolescent cocoon of Christian spirituality, the wonderful phase when we love God for the gifts of God and the ideas of God and the theology of God. But we haven’t yet learned to love God for God, because that would mean that there is something Other in the world that is “not me.”

Thoughts?