The music in my car drowned out the sounds of the streets. I was headed to a strip club and blasted Fat Joe’s “That White” in my stereo to pump myself up. My assignment was to study the place for a piece I had to write about what goes on in an average strip joint. My friend K, who doesn’t need a loud environment to lose his inhibitions (he barely has any), was my wingman for the night.
Although we’re great friends, I like to make fun of the inconsistency between his beliefs and his actions. For as long as I’ve known him, he has overloaded my Facebook feed with multiple status updates about God, Jesus, The Almighty; you name it. I constantly ask myself how he can muster up the strength to go to church on Sunday, since his Saturdays usually end six or seven hours after midnight.
K interrupted this brief moment of introspection when he screamed, “I want a fuckin’ lapdance! How much do they cost? You think forty bucks is enough?”
Even though I planned to avoid the subject that night, some lines from the song I was listening to (“We all about that gun play, but still take time out to pray every Sunday”) reminded me how fun it is to debate people who embrace hedonism while simultaneously professing their faith in God.
“Dude, I thought you were supposed to be religious!” I said. “You have a rosary on your rearview mirror, you always write about God on Facebook, and here you are talking about strippers…”
Immediately, he said, “Yeah, but fuck it! I’m down for whatever!”
His response made me laugh and I decided to let it go. “This isn’t the right time to talk about this, anyway”, I thought.
K grew up with a Catholic mother who always stressed the importance of prayer and attending mass. She does not eat meat on Good Friday, considers the Pope to be the perfect human being, and made her kids thank Baby Jesus instead of Santa Clause for the gifts they got on Christmas. Like her, K also begins each day with a prayer.
“When I wake up every morning, I ask God to let me have a good day at work. When I close a sale, cool, ‘our father who art in Heaven’…I thank him.”
His words spiked my curiosity and I felt the need to question him.
“Wait, if God is responsible for your good days at work, is it also his fault when you have a bad day?”
“Of course not!” he screamed. “God always helps those that stay positive. If I have a bad day, it’s because he has another opportunity for me down the road.”
“Are you sure it’s not because you haven’t been following the Ten Commandments?” I asked with a mischievous smile.
“Look, I follow the Ten Commandments, a’ight? I believe in doing good. You know me; you know I’m cool with everybody. I don’t steal, I don’t kill, I go to mass…but that part about ‘not coveting thy neighbor’s wife…umm…” He said while laughing smugly yet playfully.
“What about your mom, though? What does she think about the way you live?”
“Oh, she’s cool with it. She just tells me to keep praying and believing in God, and that everything will be alright.”
This statement was very surprising. The priests from the Catholic school I attended in my teenage years insisted that praying was not enough; you had to apply all the teachings of Jesus and the Bible if you wanted to go to Heaven. They also taught me that the sixth commandment (“Thou shalt not commit adultery”) forbade sex outside of marriage, that lust is one of the seven deadly sins, and that being promiscuous is one of the worst things in the world.
K doesn’t care about any of this. I can’t remember having a conversation with him where he didn’t mention his latest sexual conquests with plenty of enthusiasm. He prefers to tell these stories while sipping a bottle of his favorite drink, Heineken.
Alcohol consumption is a controversial subject within Christianity. Some evangelical and Pentecostal groups completely abstain from drinking. Catholics are slightly more flexible, but they only allow wine during communion or at dinner; drinking for fun is strictly forbidden.
K thinks that drinking is essential in any social situation. Last week, he cancelled an appointment we had made with friends to go to a basketball game because he was, in his own words, “wild as fuck, drinking whiskey and Martinis with a girl I’ve been trying to fuck for five years.”
I got slightly angry when I read this text message after I had already left my house, so I called him up to express my frustration. As soon as he picked up the phone, he said, “Yo, Alex, this woman ignored me five years ago, and God put her in front of me on a totally random day to show her that I’m not the stupid wannabe-thug I used to be. God has blessed me!”
“Oh, absolutely!” I sarcastically replied. “You’re going straight to Heaven!”
“Of course I am! I’ve been pretty wild, but I always try to do good, you know what I mean? If you act in a good way, out of good faith, God puts good things in your way!”
In the end, he didn’t get the girl’s number and his team lost by two points. God works in mysterious ways.
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