XVII. The Church of Self-Checkout.

He asked if I wanted to split the fries.

Which, on a first date, is code for:

“I’m attempting intimacy via starch.”

A mutual gesture of trust.

I nodded.

“I respect a man who leads with potatoes.”

He smiled, relieved, I think, that I could banter.

Conversation hummed.

Light stuff. Siblings. Star signs. Favorite childhood injuries.

I made him laugh with a story about getting stuck in a vending machine.

Then somewhere between the aioli and the last intact fry, he asked:

“So... are you religious?”

It was the tone people use when they’re not sure if you’ll take it as an insult.

I paused.

“No,” I said. “And also... yes.”

He nodded. Encouraging.

Wrong move.

I think he expected the usual: something vaguely spiritual, casually agnostic.

“That’s a bit of both, isn’t it?”

“Isn’t everything?” I replied.

(And meant it.)

I could have left it there.

But some questions open like trapdoors.

“I’m not religious in the sense of kneeling,” I told him.

“Though I have knelt. Often. Just not in churches.”

That did something to his expression.

A flicker—half smirk, half calculation.

The salt on the rim of my glass shimmered like a ritual gone wrong.

He waited.

Bless him.

“I think,” I said, voice lowering, not seductively,

but like a thought descending into itself:

“We’re all a little religious. Even the ones who claim otherwise. Especially them.

Belief doesn’t disappear. It just mutates.”

He tilted his head.

His smile faltered: intrigued, mildly afraid, perhaps a touch disappointed,

like the innuendo had arrived

but refused to stay for dessert.

A pause.

“How do you mean?”

And that’s when I began my sermon.

...

“Take money,” I said, hands steady now, like a magician before the reveal.

“It’s the only truly universal faith.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Money as... religion?”

“That’s the real god, isn’t it? The god we all worship.

The one we don’t question.

The one with temples in every city and sermons built into every transaction.”

He made a sound, somewhere between a laugh and a gulp.

I ignored it.

I leaned in.

“Think about it,” I said. “Money isn’t real. It’s belief. Pure and shared.

Collective hallucination. Mass consecration.

You don’t hold money. You hold symbols. Numbers. Faith.

We don’t believe in gold. We believe in pixels. In promises printed on polymer paper.

It’s not even real, and yet we plan our entire lives around it.

That’s not economics. That’s theology.”

“Currency is communion. We pass it like wafers.

Credit cards are prayer cards.

And debt—debt is sin.

Original, often.

Inherited, always.

We’re born into owing. It’s our first baptism.”

He blinked. Again.

It was happening.

“And work,” I said, gesturing like a prophet with too much espresso.

“Work is ritual. The daily genuflection.

We rise early. We sacrifice sleep.

We offer hours to the altar of productivity, hoping for salvation via pay stub.”

He stared at me like I was either brilliant or concussed. Possibly both.

I saw his hand twitch near his phone.

Maybe a text. Maybe a lifeline.

“Have you ever noticed,” I went on, “how quiet people get when money is mentioned?

How reverent? We lower our voices. We defer to it like it’s watching.

We budget, like monks rationing bread. We fast when we can’t afford lunch.

We tithe to landlords and to streaming services.

And we never question its morality, only our access to it.”

“But,” he said, “money’s just... practical, isn’t it?”

“Sure,” I said. “So is prayer. So is ritual.

So is lighting a candle and pretending someone’s listening.

The function doesn’t undo the belief.”

Another sip.

I was flying now.

“We worship billionaires like prophets.

Quote Warren Buffett like scripture.

They walk on stages, wearing sneakers and absolution.

We offer ourselves to them without thinking.

Every brand we wear: a hymn.

Every app we download: a tiny act of faith.

In data. In design. In deliverance.”

He didn’t interrupt.

Respectfully horrified.

“God isn’t dead,” I said.

“God just rebranded. Became sleek. Wearable. Exchangeable.

You don’t carry cash anymore. You carry God in your pocket,

in the form of a card you tap like a magic wand.”

A long breath. Mine, I think. Maybe his.

Hard to tell.

“I’m not saying I believe in capitalism,” I added.

“I’m saying capitalism believes in me.

And frankly, that’s more than most people do.”

He chuckled, cautiously.

“So... capitalism is a kind of church?”

I lit up.

“Yes. Capitalism is the megachurch—

shopping malls are cathedrals.

Self-checkouts are confession booths.

You place your items on the altar.

Scan. Offer up your sins in the form of impulse buys and expired coupons.

And then God says: Approved.”

I don’t know when I’d started gesturing this much.

But the saltshaker was now a prop.

He finished his drink.

I traced the condensation with a fingertip, like divining some message in the melt.

“We carry this god in our wallets,” I said. “In our apps. On our tongues.

We say, I can’t afford to rest—as if rest were immoral.

As if we must earn air.”

Credit cards,

I whispered, reverent now.

“Those are rosaries.

We carry them close, pull them out when afraid.

They say: You are worthy.

At least up to your limit.

And we believe them.

Even when we shouldn’t.”

He raised his hands in mock surrender.

“Okay, okay. So we’re all cult members.”

“Exactly,” I said.

“Late-stage capitalism is just organized belief in drag—

it wears denim. It drinks oat milk lattes.

But underneath it’s a theology of transaction.”

“You’re joking,” he said.

A question disguised as a statement.

“Am I?”

...

I gestured to the air.

“We literally call it faith when we invest.

We speak of the invisible hand of the market as if it were divine.

We get emotional over brands.

We cry over gift cards.

We experience transcendence during online checkout.”

“You’re really going all in on this,” he said, chewing slowly.

“I believe in commitment,” I said.

...

“So... what do you believe in, then? If not that?”

He wiped his hands again.

The napkin looked overwhelmed.

“I just meant like... do you celebrate Christmas,” he said.

“Oh.” I smiled, quietly wrecked.

“Yes. Commercially. Religiously. Financially. Spiritually.”

We stared at each other for a moment.

Then I said:

“I think what I actually believe in is the absurdity of the whole thing.

That we built a world around imaginary numbers,

and then gave those numbers power over life and death.”

He nodded. Unsure whether to joke or run.

“But I also believe,” I added,

softer now,

“in tenderness. In rest.

In not turning every moment into proof of worth.”

“Okay,” he said. “That’s... actually kind of beautiful.”

“I contain multitudes,” I whispered.

(And several bank accounts.

Most of which are overdrawn.)

...

When the bill came, he picked it up first.

“I’ve got this one,” he said. “As an offering.”

“Bless you,” I whispered, placing my hand on his.

“May your debit never decline.”

He laughed, genuinely this time.

He held the receipt like scripture.

“You’re kind of intense,” he said, smiling.

“Only when summoned.”

“Well,” he said, “I had fun. And I feel... restructured.”

I grinned.

“That’s religion for you.”

We paused at the corner.

He kissed my cheek — softly, like a benediction,

“text me sometime?” he asked.

“I will,” I said.

“Assuming the gods allow.”

He walked off.

I stood a minute longer,

watching a pigeon circle a dropped loonie

like it owed him something holy.

Then I turned, stepped into the light,

and offered a silent prayer

to the great god Visa:

asking for nothing,

but enough.

For what it’s worth,

-Charlene Iris

One thought at a time.

One truth at a time. 

Because some epiphanies stay with you.