Belief

The other day I was having a conversation with a friend about many things but at one point touched on religion. A woman at a nearby table overheard us and I suppose that something I said bothered her so a little later when I was sitting alone she asked if she could talk to me for a few minutes. She seemed nice, so I agreed. She started talking to me about religion. More specifically she started talking to me about what she thinks is wrong with what I believe. This seems to happen often. The reason I'm writing about it now is that in this instance I think I noticed at least one of the reasons that it does happen so often.

She called it doubt. She said that in the things I was saying she noticed a lot of doubt. I call it a willingness to question. Regardless of what you call it this seemed to be the main thing that was bothering her. I don't think it would have mattered what particular sect of what particular faith she followed but in this case it was Church on the Rock Christianity. Now I personally believe in Christianity, though she didn't believe me when I told her so, but it is not the whole of what I believe in. It was the starting point for what I believe in. It helped me to get to where I am today. The problem she had was that, in her opinion, if I did not believe specifically in Christianity to the exclusion of all else then I was wrong. That's it. While she told me these things she seemed very worried for me. I've noticed this pretty often too and I've never understood it. I think I do now. I think that the questioning, the searching for a larger truth, what she would call the doubt, scares people like her to death. I think that she needs that specific thing to grasp onto and to believe in wholeheartedly. I think she needs it just as much as I need to be able to look deeper, to look into more than one teaching, to find something a little less in your face and a little more natural.

I believe very strongly in God. I believe very strongly in religion. What I believe, however, bothers a great many people. I don't think religious arguments, fights, and wars will ever end. I don't think people will ever stop killing each other because they believe that they are right and everyone else is wrong. I know that not everyone feels that way about their faith but a great many people do. I'm going to tell you what bothered me the most about what this woman was telling me. She told me, with a terrifying conviction, that she was glad that we are at war in iraq, she wishes that the government would drill for oil in all of the protected areas, she hopes that we destroy this earth soon, she believes that we have no responsibility for what we do to this earth or to the people on it, and she believes that whatever our leaders tell us to do or do themselves is ok because God put them into those positions. She believes all of this because she thinks the faster we screw this world up and kill everyone off the fast Jesus will come. I asked her if she though we should all just nuke each other, cause a holocaust, and she said yes, because it would bring Jesus faster.

I am not afraid to not specifically believe in Christianity. I am not afraid to look at other religions and to see that in many of the most basic ways a great many of them say the same things. I am not afraid to see that every religion I have researched has some very deep truths surrounded by a lot of ceremony, rules, and fear. I am not afraid, and I will not believe in anything out of fear. I do not believe that God, who created everything, would tie himself down into such a tiny, complicated, conflicted, and tortuous little box. I don't think he would want such a small section of humanity to have the benefit of growing up under his grace and all the rest of the "unsaved" in this world are just unlucky in that they were born somewhere else. I believe that it is about love. I do not believe that it is about having the right book, or the right leader, or following the right ceremony. I don't mean that these are not ways to find God. I think that most of them are. I just don't think, like most of them will tell you, that they are the only way.

God is in all of us from the moment we are brought into this world until the moment we leave it. Anyone can find God. Look into yourself, look into the natural world around you. God is everywhere. I don't believe he can be confined in the ways that we have always tried to confine him. I think it helps many people to understand if He can be made a little smaller. I believe that everyone has the right to believe what they wish to believe. I don't believe that anyone is qualified to tell anyone else that their beliefs are wrong. I think that the refusal to question, the refusal to listen, the refusal to search, to look around, to look deeper, or to see or hear anything outside of the tunnel is fine, but don't tell someone else that they can't. Or shouldn't. Fear is a powerful thing, but I am not afraid. I don't not believe in believing in one faith out of fear that you might be wrong not to. I don't believe that God is that small.

I do believe in Love.