The broken always find their way into churches, eventually. There is one every week. They sit at the back in the extra row of folding chairs pressed against the wall, just listening, sometimes trying to pray. Today it is the girl with the swollen belly and chipped finger nail polish, whose prayers to the God she is not sure exists, are for the boy whom she has loved. The one with raven hair and crimson wrists. Next to her, slumps the man with the wilting roses and scabbed knuckles. The scent of gin clings to his tongue as he recites the prayer his mother taught him thirty years ago. “Hail Mary, full of grace...” He hopes that if he repeates it enough times, his guilt will fall away.
The broken always find their way into churches, eventually. I’ve seen it a thousand times. They walk through the pews as if they were headstones, and each churchgoer a body. It is not the stainglass windows that brings them to the holy building. But I have often seen a broken soul run their hand along the colored glass, feeling the coolness under their finger tips. The lost come searching, for God...for answers. They do not yet know the difference between the two. All they know is that they have a broken rubber band body, that their life is missing a few puzzle pieces, and they are just desperate enough to look for God.