A Visit To The Temple

I went to the local temple yesterday hoping for a quick blessing and maybe a benediction. But after checking in, an acolyte came and got me. She took me to a small room and had me lie down on a cot and then began examining me.

As I opened myself to her, she used a mirror and a small pen light to see in the dark spaces inside my head. Though she was wearing a mask, I could tell that she was frowning.

"How often do you pray?" she asked me.

I couldn't remember the last time. I pretended to not hear her. She took that as an admission.

"Looks like you've got some sin in here," she said, poking around with her sharp stick. "That's going to have to come out."

She went and got the priest. The priest arrived and bent over me and looked inside. She had a kind face, but she was also very perceptive. She poked one of my sins gently and asked me whether it hurt. It did.

She talked to her acolyte for a second then came back and lowered the light over me.

"First I'm going to have to numb your pain," she said.

She put something that tasted like hot coal in my mouth and a warmth spread over me. Then she brought out a sharp drill and began hacking away at my inner depths, removing sin from me. It screamed while it was being attacked. A high-pitched whine that frightened me. I grabbed hold of the cots sides and held on for dear life. The priest smiled at me and asked whether I was in pain, but I admitted that I was not in pain. It was the anticipation of pain that made me imagine the worst sort of searing fire and the gnashing of teeth. As every chunk of sin was removed, I remembered how it had been made and I realized what a fool I'd been all along.

Before I knew it, the priest was done. She put down her pointy tool and smiled.

"How do you feel?"

My sin was gone and so was my pain. I felt lighter. I felt a fire rekindling in me. I smiled back. Though I had imagined the worst sort of pain in the removal of sin, in fact, there had been no pain at all except the pain I had brought in with me.

"Good," she said. Then she washed away the remains of my sin and told me to spit them out.

"Now, I want you to pray daily," she explained. "And take care not to sin again. As much I enjoy your visits, I'd much rather you come here and we can just talk - maybe the occasional cleansing, but that's about it."

I got out of that cot and thanked her and the acolyte profusely and then I went on my way feeling like I'd been reborn.