"Like what?"
It dashed him a trifle. "Well, Phil—" (old friend of dad, I reminded myself) "I don't suppose you've been in a church for a long time."
"Not to my knowledge."
That got him again. "And I don't suppose you've ever been in a church like mine. Don't get the idea I'm about to ask you over to hear me preach. A preacher like yourself—you see, I've read your books—wouldn't be much interested in the rhetorical efforts of a chap like me." He was a little nervous, now, and actually a shade humble. "What I'm driving at is this. We've got a young people's society that has thrown doctrine out the window—not caring how much stained glass broke—and is trying to get some meaning out of religion by putting some new meaning in it."
"Sounds trenchant."
"I want you to come over, Phil, and talk to my young people. They're readers of yours. We've discussed your books at meetings—gone through them chapter by chapter—had some real battles! It's our feeling that, at bottom, you're as earnest a Believer as any of the rest of us. I've sprung some surprises on my young folks—Phil—but springing you would really rock them."
The Buick salesman touch.
I told him—as nicely as I could—about never making speeches, and why. It's always embarrassing.
He covered up his very annoyed disappointment and decided all I needed was a working-over. He began this by ignoring the invitation—after a little more pressure got him nowhere. He talked about his church and the young people and their outlook:
"You'd be interested in learning what's going on among religious liberals, Phil. In fact, you owe it to yourself to find out! And your writing shows you don't know! Dogma has simply gone overboard—and I mean overboard. We're studying psychology as hard as you are. We take up a book like the late Liebman's Peace of Mind—and learn to understand it. Hell-fire and damnation—original sin—that sort of rubbish—is out. We'll listen to a communist over there as attentively as to a priest. We believe Christ would have made the fair distribution of goods His business—if He were alive now. We sit around and air sex problems as frankly as the professors. Use their lingo. We don't believe religion ought to be a lifelong way of pain and hardship and self-torment and sorrow—"