Burnt Offerings

If you asked me why I decided to move to Portland, I'd tell you God told me to. I was 27, juggling two teaching jobs, living with my parents, and utterly exhausted. Then COVID hit. Suddenly, I was laid off from one job, still teaching, drinking excessively, and dedicating all my free time to community organizing. I started a food pantry on my lawn, collected three thousand dollars in supplies for the United Farm Workers, and protested daily for Black Lives Matter. I was still exhausted and miserable, but with a higher blood alcohol content, things felt more tolerable.

Instead of using the COVID lockdown to learn a new skill, bake sourdough, or travel to national parks, I used it to decompose in my childhood bed while trying to care for everyone else around me. During one particular bout of decomposition, a video about the SPICES testimony randomly appeared on my YouTube channel at 11 p.m. I watched for about 20 minutes before bursting into tears. The video elicited a profound spiritual response. I ran into the living room and asked my dad if we had any Quaker family. He didn’t think so, but we later discovered my grandmother was a Quaker descendant. I started attending San Jose Monthly Meeting and found Quaker Voluntary Service. Three months later, I was packing my car with mostly houseplants (they've all since died) and driving 14 hours north to Portland.

I remember calling my father on the drive up, convinced it was a mistake. Driving through eastern Oregon, I saw roadside "attractions" proclaiming Jesus was watching me, that He hated queers, and "God bless President Trump." This was not the liberal, hippie dreamscape I'd been promised. My ever-supportive and loving Dad talked me down from the ledge of anxiety. As I rounded a big turn into Portland and was met with the city's skyscrapers, "Oh, this is a real place," I remember saying. "I told you,” My father replied before I hung up.

I met my new housemates, all much younger than me and fresh out of college. They talked about five-year plans and big ideas. I, unfortunately, brought a dose of nihilism to the conversation, suggesting that five-year plans rarely succeed and sometimes all we can do is survive. Though we had so little in common—I went to a big state school while they attended elitist private schools with trust funds—I still loved them. I thought I had it made: no rent, no utilities, just a small credit card bill, and the freedom to do good things in the world. I was paired with the incomparable Marge Abbott as my spiritual mentor, and Alison Kriger was my site supervisor. I felt finally attuned to the universe and what Spirit expected of me. I worshipped regularly and felt I could hear Spirit in meditation. My heart was full, and my hopes were big. I was going to get through the year, gain experience, and then apply to graduate school.

And then, about six months later, God shut up.

I'm not quite sure exactly when He decided to eighty-six His way out of the conversation, but He did. Instead of finding peace and messages in worship, my brain spun with anxious thoughts about money and panicked about the future. I was pseudo-dating a man I worked with who couldn’t decide what he wanted from me. It was exhausting, and I was jealous, constantly thinking about it. My site placement, working in a community for developmentally disabled adults, was immensely difficult on my body. I would come home and sleep for hours. I started obsessively reading tarot and my horoscope, seeking some guidance from the universe, but all I found was paranoia. I couldn't bring myself to read Quaker literature, attend a meeting, or reach out to Marge. I was a total and complete nervous wreck.

I processed my stress and anxiety in the only accessible way I could: eating from delivery apps. I ran through my savings on takeout, nail appointments, and sightseeing trips around Portland. I was so anxious and out of alignment, doing anything to feel normal again. I ended the year with significantly less money, more damage and miles on my car, and still attached to a man who made me feel like garbage. However, I liked my job and was good at it, and I wanted to continue working there. So, what was supposed to be a one-year stay in Portland turned into a three-year one. And God was still out of the picture.

I tried everything looking for Him. I fasted, went to Catholic Church, went to Synagogue, and went on hikes. I practiced lectio divina, searching for guidance, but all I found were passages about making more burnt offerings (thanks, I guess?). I was knocking on His door, and He was screening me with His Ring camera, telling me to "go away." I went to therapy and got on medication, but still couldn't level out. I was barely able to function at work and barely able to take care of myself. Suddenly, the very cool social justice badass I once was became a distant memory. The thought of applying to graduate school seemed out of the question because I didn’t want more loans, and I was so, so lost. Social work sounded exhausting, and so did public health, and my undergraduate degree was sitting in a drawer, gathering dust.

Anxiety is not a new feeling for me; I had my first panic attack at 7, and it has been a constant, ever-present companion since then. Day-to-day, it is relatively controlled. However, whenever money, security, or insecure romantic relationships emerge, it is always overwhelming. You could say I was living the triple whammy. For the first time in my adult life, I became aware that one unanticipated expense could leave me on the streets. I had little to no backup plan and felt so guilty for being irresponsible with my money. I had some tools to help me, but even they only took me so far. To top it off, it was obvious my boyfriend was one bad day away from saying "toodaloo" and driving off into the sunset without me. I often feel most calm when I am in alignment with a situation, a person, a job, society, the universe. But that feeling has been so hard to find, and every time I do, like a butterfly, it eventually flies away. Attunement is this brief, effervescent feeling of happiness that catapults me from one path in life to another and leaves me to deal with the consequences.

Looking back at my life, I have found that true alignment with the divine can only be easily found when my needs are met. When there is no worry about when and what you might eat. When you are not afraid of sudden and dramatic homelessness. When you know that your imported medications from China will still be affordable. Perhaps the lack of spiritual and emotional attunement we see growing in our society is all by design: to keep us needy, groveling, and focused on making ends meet. By keeping the masses distracted, they become solely focused on their day-to-day—not on their dreams, hopes, and aspirations, nor on what their true path to happiness might be, but why a carton of eggs costs $5.00. I would speculate that one of the goals of neo-fascism, as we are experiencing it now, is to disconnect us from source. To keep us afraid and distracted. To take away the God of empathy and compassion as we know Him, and to replace Him with dictators and outdated conservatism. The poor will continue to starve and suffer, lacking hope and guidance. Economic warfare not only affects the physical well-being of a person but also their spiritual wholeness; it prevents the nervous system from relaxing enough to come out of fight or flight and to commune with Spirit. It forces us to work long hours and not take time out for ourselves or our physical and mental health. It causes us to self-isolate and not help each other when we need it. We are all closer to being on the street than we are to being billionaires, and we are all closer to spiritual dullness than to enlightenment.

The next few years are going to be tough. Things were already tough on the working class, and they are only going to get worse. We have already seen it happening. If you find yourself with racing thoughts and anxiety whenever you try to be with Spirit, know you are not alone. If you find yourself wondering if you are a small puppy left abandoned in a hot car, you are not alone. If you find yourself feeling up and down and inconsistent, you are not alone. If you struggle to let go of overwhelming thoughts and cyclical panic, you are not alone. And if you find yourself questioning if there is really ‘that of God in everyone,’ you are not alone. These times and trials are not new to Quakers. It is up to us to live up to our values and doctrine as much as we can, even if we can’t feel God. He’s there; it’s just hard to feel Him when others are exercising their use of free will to harm instead of help. It will take extreme fortitude and a little bit of luck to make it through. We will need community more than ever, and we will need to attune with each other as much as we need to try to attune with Source.

Together, it will be difficult, and together we will get through. And maybe we need to make more burnt offerings.

Christina Dunbar served as a Quaker Voluntary Service fellow in 2020-2021. When she isn’t on long road trips and going to minor league baseball games, she runs the office at Breitenbush Hot Springs.