Somewhere along the way I lost my Faith. Apparently, I have also given up the idea of belief as well. Living in this era, I should not be surprised by the victory of reason and logic over mythology and superstition, for it seems only logical and reasonable. It's not the loss that I mourn, but rather the fact that I have found no real satisfaction in the act of thinking my way out. I understand why people have always needed a way to address the mysteries in life. I wish I was a bit more content to let them have their myths without feeling that I am still missing something grand and wondrous about life itself. The act of Being -- the Here and Now. The reasons, logic, and meaning remain obscure to me.
Is it my early indoctrination which continues to create this storm inside my head? The feeling that, since I have had to give one thing up, I must have something else to replace it? I know from my study that human beings learn early on to recognize patterns, otherwise as the brain develops it would become overwhelmed at the sensory input and simply shut down. Pattern recognition is essential to effective functioning and safety. We each carry around inside our minds some idea about what it means to be "normal", to be "human", to be "safe". We never really think about it, because we form these ideas as our brains set their neural pathways to disregard things and objects outside the patterns during early childhood. One of the problems I am having right now is with the notion that people of faith have regarding what it means to be right or wrong, and how that information may affect one after life ends.
Christianity (the only religion with which I have had extended personal contact) as a system of thought involves many contradictions. If you listen in church and study the Bible, you become aware of what type of actions, thoughts, and life constitutes the good, and which comprises the bad. Boiling it all down (if I may), humans possess a soul which will live beyond death, and we must understand and believe in a pattern which we can emulate and embrace in order to have some sort of better pattern to a future existence in another place. We are to deny the good things about being human as well as the bad, in order for God to "do his work in us". If we are not okay with this, the simplest explanation is that we were born with the stain of sin -- in this case Pride. However -- in order to discern this we need to be at least smart enough to see the pattern. So good becomes bad, and bad becomes good. That is, I need to give myself over to irrational belief in order to become a better human being. If I become a better human, I assume I would be even better at thinking, pattern recognition, and meaning and understanding. But by doing this, I am going against the exhortations of ministers, prophets, and God himself by "leaning on my own understanding". Is it any wonder so many people cannot make sense of this once they see it?
I have been told many times that God will replace these doubts and fears if I would just agree to a relationship with him. I have tried this many times during my life, in various ways and venues using many different approaches and rituals. Okay, so maybe the patterns of my life or thinking change for a time, but be it good, bad, or indifferent, how am I to know whether or not it is simply coincidence? The great debate between rationality and belief? The answer is I cannot, because I do not see a pattern, other than a series of attempts to grasp the metaphysical which seems ingrained in me. The final truth, for me, is that I cannot have a one-way relationship with anyone on any level. And as human beings are nothing if not social creatures, I do not believe anyone else can either. So I have to conclude that this mystery has no solution. But the fact that I need it to will continue to bother me.
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