Take Off Your Shoes

Oct 21, 2020 | By Jadan Anderson MC ‘22

God makes strange first impressions. When God introduced himself to Moses, He decided to do so as a bush that was on fire. What’s more, the first thing God said to Moses wasn’t “hello” or “I am God,” but “take off your sandals.” 

When I hear the term “holy ground” I think about the Catholic churches of my childhood. I was taught that people should greet God with their very best, especially in His own space. For that reason, I showered before every Mass, donned my finest clothes, and put on my designated, closed-toed church shoes. It seemed that everyone at Mass did the same. Though I enjoyed dressing up on Sundays, the older I grew the more I perceived an element of hiddenness under all the garb. By the time I was a teenager, I thought those fancy clothes were something of a separation between us and our holy God, or at least symbolized a need to be more or be better in order to approach God. But I kept dressing up because, if I ever arrived at church barefoot, my grandparents would rain fire upon my mom and dad.