existential_james
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2008
(Not really so much of a "story," as a philosophical essay. You don't have to agree, by the way...)
Let me begin by saying this: I wasn't raised in a Christian home. But, since I was very young, my idea of religion was inherently flawed. In all of my interactions with Christians, Sunday School teachers, Youth leaders, pastors, friends, the idea was that a belief is the same as knowledge. Objective knowledge, to be more specific. And at the time, I accepted that – for the longest time, it seemed obvious that God was something that one could say "I know God exists, without a shadow of doubt." I fondly remember a time when religion was a simple thing; you either believed or you didn't, and if you weren't sure, then you probably didn’t believe. You had to be certain, and I quote, "beyond the shadow of doubt." This was one of my youth minister’s idioms. He's a really good guy – what Christ you see left in me after this is because of his guidance. That's why this is going to hurt.
I don't believe in God anymore – or rather, I can't. There have been times all throughout my life where I've wondered why I, or others believed in God. What is the point of belief – what did it accomplish? I think that if it's for some extrinsic (or external) reward, the belief becomes shallow – it becomes a self-serving endeavor: “What can associating with this belief do for me?” If it's for an intrinsic (internal) reward, then it's noble, yes, but it loses any effect when you attempt to share it. Intrinsic rewards are necessarily subjective ["pertaining to or characteristic of an individual," or "placing excessive emphasis on one's own moods, attitudes, opinions, etc.; unduly egocentric"]. Extrinsic rewards are supposed to be objective [“not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased,” or “intent upon or dealing with things external to the mind rather than with thoughts or feelings,” or "of or pertaining to something that can be known, or to something that is an object or a part of an object; existing independent of thought or an observer as part of reality."]. I didn't want my belief in God to be a simple matter of "I don't want to go to Hell," or even that "I want to go to Heaven." That idea seemed pathetic to me, that we would feel so pessimistically negative about our own state of physical existence, so that we could no longer find any real meaning in anything here; it was always about looking forward to Heaven. On the surface, it looks poetic: as Paul puts it, “I count all things as loss for the sake of knowing Christ.” But in actuality, it was sadly ironic in that our very state of physical existence was supposed to be God-breathed, God-ordained, God-created. No, I wanted it to be... different than that. The Truth, yes, but a hidden one – I wanted it to be the Narrow Gate it was made out to be. I wish I could put it simpler.
And why would I want Christianity to be a matter of subjectivity? Of aesthetic; or passion? It was simple: I had seen what Christianity is viewed as. It seems so condemning. Vocal Christians spewing condemnations, demanding outright war against Islamic States in the Middle East; Churches left and right endorsing a no tolerance campaign against homosexuality, abortion, and many other things that are condemned in the Holy Bible – and even some that are endorsed by it (like the separation of Church and State). It all seemed like the death of Civil Liberty, and for what reason? My original hope was that if I could explain Christianity as an aesthetic choice, as a matter of subjective passion, we would drop our pride in our beliefs, which insist we maintain an inspiring, mature, Christ-like level of deep humility – we would lose our need, and our will, to condemn others (intentionally or not) for their differences that make them who they are. Yes, those differences may sometimes be condemned by Scripture, but other things, such as unconditional love, are held in much higher importance by these divine laws – from the very words of Christ himself. Unconditional love is the key – how many of us can say we can love unconditionally?
But no, this Christianity of passion and love that I sought after was not the Christianity I was taught to accept. This was nothing more than a collection of political and social ideas – prejudices by which to judge others, with Jesus' name signed to it as if it were all His idea. Coming to church meant you were subjected to those judgmental stances. It was about what other people expected of you; how they expected you to act, speak, vote, and believe. Not merely what to believe, but how to believe and apply that belief. Or at least, that's how it felt to me – I always felt pressured while I was in church. Some of the pressure was external – things like being pressured into making decisions for Christ, praying in front of groups, being a leader, etc. Some of the pressure was internal – trying to really watch my actions and words so that they'd appear in a way that was acceptable to the surroundings. I hated these pressures – it seemed like I had to put on a show, or hide my true self, just to go to church. The church was not first and foremost a place for reflection, contemplation, guidance, comfort, or even acceptance, but a medium in which to purport an elitist pro-Levitical Law social (and political to a small degree) standard. And by you having a Christian belief, and associating with Christ, you were expected to adhere strictly to those same politically conservative beliefs as well – no exceptions. This wasn’t about loving God, and loving others; this was far more akin to blackmail than anything.
If you don't believe me, here, I ask this: just how many Christians do you know that do not vote strictly Republican? How many Christians do you know that vote liberal, in favor of equal civil rights, or peace?
And I was spending time defending this belief, with these unspoken injustices! This is the reason why Christianity is no longer appealing. This is why the evangelical efforts of Christians are starting to become ineffective. This is why people want to distance themselves from God. It’s because Christians are so willing to associate God with ideals directly counter-intuitive to the message Christ taught, especially within a governmental context. We're not interested in God – we're interested in purporting Old Testament morality. What interest in God we had at this point was that He was the extrinsic reward – not something distant to look forward to, nothing more. I distinctly remember many sermons on how, compared to the promise of Heaven, this world doesn't matter at all. No; things like love, peace, and respect didn't truly matter in the long run. People didn’t matter in the long run, unless they knew how truly horrible they were so that they’d accept Christ. It wasn't really a success until you made someone feel like a failure for being who they were – for doing what they thought was right.
I find it oddly hypocritical, that these people would miss so much of what Jesus says. Sure, we may know His parables front and back, and have a few good interpretations of each of them up our sleeves, but we could still miss so much of it. It may not be intentional, but it doesn’t occur to us that Jesus could be speaking about us as well – not just the Pharisees. Or we might hear a sermon on Jesus walking on the water, and having Peter step out of the boat, and there will be some grand moral or ethical lesson involved with it about how we need to change our lives for Jesus. As if we were living the worst, meaningless lives of sin imaginable, as if it were a comfort, and outside of that was God ("Come to church!"). Not a single thought was given, or entertained, to this metaphorical boat being the Church itself, or what a little self-reflection could do to enhance these messages to apply to our own lives, or even that the change had anything to do with one's approach to Christianity. Or what one could be as a Christian through it. There is an almost sickening dissonance in the way many Christians live; the balance between what they say, and what they associate with – not that there isn’t in the way I live, there certainly is, but I’m not playing a Jesus card in order to purport myself as morally superior.
Is it about serving and pleasing God - that is to say, showing humility through selfless love while on Earth, so that people would not see you, but rather, the Christ in you? Or is it rather about appeasing yourself, your parents, your ministers, or whoever, by hanging out with Christian friends, wearing your Jesus t-shirts, and losing all sense of individuality by adhering to a clique dictated less by the words of Jesus than by the association with Jesus? It’s kind of easy to love unconditionally when you’re surrounding yourself with people just like you. There are no conditions to have to work to love, then. And then you condemn everyone who is different, saying that it’s “love.” Love seems to be the “in” thing, in concept, but is it acted out? We wear our “Love is the Movement,” shirts, we write love on our arms, and while it may seem very loving to us, it’s very excluding to the people we think we’re trying to reach out to. Don’t forget 1 John 4:18, where it says "There is no love in fear?" All we're doing is alienating what we insist is God's creation, for our own political and social gains. Do you believe God created a round world, and all its inhabitants? Or do you believe that God just created the United States and Christians? If the former, then why wouldn’t you truly strive for peace, understanding, and the conditions that unconditional love requires you to love through? If the latter, continue as such (though scripture doesn’t agree with you).
And no, you may not necessarily do these things directly – I admit, they’re general, and I can only speak from my own vantage point. You may not be the one going out to abortion clinics, funerals, war rallies, or the Gay Pride parade holding your big picket signs with the harshest of Biblical condemnations on them. And no, you may not be the guy speaking out against diversity or differences in belief, race, sexual preference, etc. You may actually be very loving and caring, in person, but do you support these actions? Be careful before you answer. It shows in the company you keep and the conversations you have, and in the political and social stances you have. Throughout my life, people have tried to impress upon me an importance of adhering to a respectable morality by showing me that I'm being watched by my superiors – or looked up to, being expected to set the example. Well, I'm watching and paying attention to you people who wear your Christianity like a badge, who find yourselves not only being looked up to as an example in daily life, but in the Church as well. You would do well to watch carefully what you say about people different than you. You prioritize according to the prejudices your Bible contains that put you in the best light. Your actions speak louder than any words you may tell me in private conversation. I know full well, these are just words to you. This life doesn't matter; not compared to Heaven, at least. I tried to identify for so long with this worldview, thinking it to be the correct way to live (after all, you have all set the example for me), but I hated who I had become. This is what drove me away, initially. That's what caused the first little slice of cynicism to creep in.
At that point, I had lost my trust in most Christians; I didn’t want to be known as one, I didn’t want to associate with them. That’s not to say that I didn’t – I just didn’t want to. For a while, I hated myself even more, so I set out to figure out exactly why I felt this way. I started to really study things, then. In my naive attempts to justify Christianity despite the ironic condemnations thereof, I eventually came to Christian apologetics. I found myself unable to completely trust other Christians. Loving them? Yes. But not trusting them. I was highly suspicious, so I latched on to the springboard I received from evangelical training I took while I was in High School. What I sought after couldn't be solved by talking to people I could barely trust anymore. They had unintentionally burned that bridge when I adhered to the thought, and hated myself. I knew something was wrong. I looked into philosophy. For a while, I defended Christianity. I engaged in religious and philosophical debate on a regular basis. I might've made some good points in favor of Christianity, but I didn’t make the mistake of not listening to other people and their arguments.
I started looking deeper into the reasons why one believes in God, from a philosophical view. I learned that this extrinsic reward that Christianity suggests (i.e. Heaven as an afterlife) is a contrived substitute for the purpose(s) of Christianity; the idea is just there to motivate you to conform. It's not only a substitute for what we would call the meaning of life, but also a substitute for what Jesus was talking about. All of these different purposes we arbitrarily attribute to something that has no accessibly inherent or immediately obvious purpose, like God, aren't effective at all in these exchanges – and that’s not even getting into what different denominations and sects of Christianity push! These purposes are only effective to us, only in so far as our passion, dedication, and motivation (however corrupted it may be at this point) can fuel us in our attempts to justify our own beliefs. And, no matter how passionate or dedicated you are, the person you're talking to isn't going to be even remotely compelled to believe you unless they already so much as slightly lean toward that opinion on the matter themselves. For instance, if they live in an area where belief in God is the standard, or at least the majority, then I’m sure the idea isn’t going to sound outlandish or offensive to them and they’ll feel more inclined to believe just to fit in.
The problem with these exchanges, and a biased approach to them, is in that God is not objectively knowable. Believing "beyond a shadow of doubt," is impossible beyond the desires of an individual. But don't mistake that as me making a statement about the entirety of human knowledge (or epistemology). I'm only talking about God here, since God is a matter of belief and not a matter of fact (if it were a matter of fact, then everyone would believe by default, and there would be no purpose to evangelism at all). The only way that God could be a matter of fact is if God was within our sense perception. And while some would argue that God is within sense perception, I say otherwise. If God is within the sense perception of very fallible, very small humans like us, then I ask you: just how big do you think God is? The assertion that you can know that God exists, beyond all doubt, is in effect, blasphemy. Christianity holds faith as one of the three linchpins of its belief (Next to hope and love, according to I Cor. 13:11-13). But if you say you "know beyond the shadow of doubt," it's not really faith at all, is it? What a worthless belief that is, devoid of any power and inspiration it may have had before! But that's not to say you cannot, or should not believe in God. We'll come back to that in a moment.
That may not be convincing enough for you, though. Let me expound on what I mean by that. Not only could it be considered blasphemy to be absolutely certain that God exists, but it's an epistemological problem as well. This whole 'epistemology' thing is kind of hard to grasp, anyway. How do we define our epistemology? Usually, in order for something to be accepted as objectively known, it has to be reliably observable, testable, and repeatable – free of any and all bias. That doesn't mean it has to be empirical, or physical, by the way: Love exists, because we can observe love; we can test love; we can repeat love. We can't quantify it, of course, and we can't take a picture of love, but we can be certain that love exists. [For more information on this distinction, I suggest watching this video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wX_W1BB_0M - it puts it as "injunction, apprehension, and confirmation." But, it’s the same thing.] The way to get out of this vicious circle of thought, this hypocrisy of words you attribute to yourself, is to simply admit you could be wrong. Admit Christianity as a subjective aesthetic, and no one can challenge your faith. However, the backlash from that is that you forfeit your rights to condemn others, or to tell others that they’re going to be subjected to divine wrath for not doing what you say. Could you stand to lose that, for the sake of humility? Or, rather, I should say, for the sake of reverence toward God? Do me a favor; think on that, and get back to me.
There is absolutely nothing about God that adheres to our epistemology, without the help of obvious biases such as subjective interpretation (which does render God observable, testable, and repeatable, but only if one wants to see things in this specific way - you create your reality around your opinions, not the other way around), and possibly even imagination. (That's not intended to be pejorative, by the way; I'm being serious. The process of imagining something that is so much greater than us is a truly humbling endeavor. Especially once we get set on something and say, “Bigger.” It puts things into perspective, and can be very life-changing. The process of imagination should be rewarded for its insight value.) Though, biased interpretations of observations don't constitute any objective proof of God. Our objective truths come from repeated unbiased observation, in fact. If 100 people of different backgrounds did the same experiment and come out with different results (with similar ones for similar backgrounds, beliefs, etc) it's probably biased. If they all come out with the same, or very similar, results (excluding outliers, of course), it's probably not. This is what separates our scientific laws and theories from myths, by the way. In order for something to be considered objective, there has to be a process of an injunction - you can't look for evidence to back up the conclusion, you have to figure out a conclusion that fits the evidence.
Of course, if there is no evidence for something, then it’s a good idea to not go with that conclusion. Though, right here many people would say “but you can’t disprove it, therefore it must be true.” I don’t have to disprove it. The burden of proof is on the person making the assertion for the existence of God, in this case. If there’s nothing completely reliable and incontrovertible to lean on in a conclusion for something, especially something of such potential importance as the existence of God, then there’s no reason to go with that choice. From there, apologetics becomes ineffective and shuts down, and becomes part of the ‘religion,’ of Christianity. You feel you must defend God, but you have no passion, no true interest in pursuing the greatness of God. Believe me; I’m speaking from experience here. If I had any sort of high ground on which to give any sort of advice, this would be it: do not let your Christianity become a boring matter of following rules, conforming to the status quo, or stubbornly insisting that Christianity is ‘fact.’ Do not forget the aesthetic, the subject; have some passion in this pursuit! If we notice that something that we're doing isn't working, then we need to stop doing that, and try something else.
Survival of the Fittest isn't an idea that evolutionary biology has a monopoly on. It applies to philosophy, thought, technology, religion, and the development of civilization. This type of civilization that you and I are used to, this way of existence, digitally communicating, is vastly different from others on this earth, for example a primitive tribe in South America. Our languages, social norms, how we eat, what we eat, how we dress, how we act, etc. are all different in our different cultures. We've all got our different ideas on how to live life. And the ones that work are still here. The ones that don't work aren't here anymore. For all we know, there may have been an ancient civilization that thought it was pragmatic to stand naked out in waist deep water in the middle of winter. Those people are dead - our civilizations have survived. It didn't ever have to come about from some divine plan. This is why I am making the decision I am – my desire to above all prove Christianity as being the one true religion has left me emotionless and ineffective in that pursuit. Christianity hangs like a dead weight on my conscience, and what’s left of my heart, and I need it to go away now – my heart is needed elsewhere. The collateral is worth it, in my opinion. For this, at least.
If you were still interested in holding belief in God as objectively true, by this point I have given you no footholds. Except for one, but it is cripplingly counter-intuitive: to insist that the human mind works solely in objective truths, and that all of our opinions are products of deduction. But if the mind does work like this, then there is no such thing as opinion, belief, impulse, passion, prejudice, or emotion at all. Aesthetic wouldn’t exist – as everything would be designed solely with practicality in mind. There would be nothing to make us want to believe in any God or not; nothing to convince us of that, as there wouldn’t be any emotions to play on. Nothing would be personal, or private, but most importantly, there would be no love in the world. Everything would adhere closely to logic and reason, and no one would dare disagree with it - they would have no inclination to at all; no creativity. But, on the other hand, there has to be at least some objective truth, otherwise things go completely in the opposite direction: solipsism, and complete, arbitrary relativism; absolute anarchy of ideas, thought, feelings, understanding and interaction; with no intent on learning, truth, or making any progress in the fields of technology, medicine, literature, communication, science. We would still be in the Stone Age, hitting each other with rocks for sport. But these are very extreme scenarios, which I do not endorse taking seriously.
There is a line between proposing a belief as objectively certain, and proposing a belief as objectively uncertain. That line is where humility is. Religion shouldn’t be considered a matter of absolute subjectivity, or absolute objectivity. We should at least be aware of our own epistemological limits and abilities before making any statements about God’s existence being objectively certain or logically imperative. It’s also a good idea to be aware of what exactly the beliefs we hold say is admirable. To continue with this, I would like to draw attention to the implications of purporting Christianity as objectively true in the guise of 'faith.' This should be my only Søren Kierkegaard quote, but it’s a very effective quote if one comprehends it: "If I am capable of grasping God objectively, I do not believe, but precisely because I cannot do this I must believe. If I wish to preserve myself in faith I must constantly be intent upon holding fast the objective uncertainty, so as to remain out upon the deep, over seventy fathoms of water still preserving my faith.”
From that, I ask: What is admirable about being absolutely certain in a belief that considers faith to be one of its main linchpins?
Whether you believe that God’s existence is objectively true, or not, the very fact that you hold this opinion and others might not proves that it is a subjective choice. In addition, the fact that there’s no way to effectively explain what God is, or provide any reason that one should believe in this God (aside from the aesthetic, which isn’t objective), removes your ability to purport this belief as anything other than a simple opinion. What few logical persuasions that do support this conclusion are just that: persuasions that were intentionally thought out strengthen the standing conclusion. Was there ever an interest in finding out whether God truly exists or not? I think not; apologetics was invented as a means to defend an arbitrary, aesthetic belief. As such, all the arguments in favor of said belief can be boiled down to biased, contrived interpretations of literally anything at all that you can observe. Just what objective effect can these arguments have? A belief predicated on interpretation has no power that can convince anyone else - at least, not in a way that isn't a form of blackmail. It's very similar to the first compelling argument for the Existence of God, which was: "So, you don't believe in God? Well, here's a bayonet up your ass!" This is why Christianity has survived so long in this way: it was the social expectation; the cultural norm - nothing more. Again, you can't look for evidence to back up the conclusion, you have to figure out a conclusion that fits the evidence. It’s just grasping at philosophical straws.
The 'proofs,' one has for a God aren't proof at all unless one specifically wants them to be a proof. You should agree that God is beyond our ability to know with certainty - to comprehend fully. (If you don’t agree, then I think you’ve got some serious issues.) If we can comprehend it, it's not God. The uncertainty is what makes faith powerful. That's what makes it admirable, in the end. What's the point of faith if you know beyond the shadow of a doubt that God exists? “Faith does not offer the least support for a proof of objective truth. Here the ways of men part: if you wish to strive for peace of soul and pleasure, then believe; if you wish to be a devotee of truth, then inquire.” This is the backlash you're getting into. When you exploit a loop-hole in logic to make God's existence logically imperative, you are unknowingly allowing any other random, faith-based claim or opinion to be considered in that same realm of being logically imperative. You don't want that; the association belittles your belief and makes it worthless. [For more information on what I mean here, I suggest you watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdneXwe6Q4o]
That’s the last of my philosophical ramble, here. Take it or leave it. Don’t misunderstand what I mean by going on this route. I’ll say this once: the enemy is not God, or belief in a God. Whether one believes in a God or not is a personal choice and personal choices shouldn't be discouraged. No one can make the decision to truly believe in a God for someone else (I emphasize "truly," in lieu of "I don't want a bayonet up my ass, so I'll say I believe in God"). Rebellion isn’t a goal, here. The enemy is, and always was, the misapplication of those beliefs. What’s virtuous about forcing a belief on someone else, or using it as a standard upon which to judge everyone else on the grounds of morality or ethics? Is the world leader virtuous if he wants to use his power to level a country that has an anti-Christian bias? Or is Fred Phelps virtuous, the man who completely misrepresents the very sine qua non of Christianity as Jesus put it: "The most important [commandment] is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
No, what I was expecting all along to be in and of Christianity has left it. It has become too much of a dogmatic system of rules, and not a personal system of humble passion, with reverence toward God. For this reason, in order to pursue the qualities of Christianity that I find worthy of pursuing, I am leaving it. As I said, my heart is needed elsewhere now – my effort is needed elsewhere; my love is. The simplest way to put it is that I just don’t believe in God. It’s not that I don’t want to, or that I find it stupid to do so. It’s just that I can’t believe. I don’t have the strength to stretch myself in two different directions for what this belief requires. I have heard Christianity described as a backwards life. I find it very, very backwards (or at least, very ironic) that in order to truly follow its teachings (which, I hold the words of Jesus to be of utmost importance here), I must pitilessly murder my association with them. I have other things to attend to, to be honest, and I simply don't care to know if there is a God or not; much less to spend the time following one. I don’t need to believe in a God to gain insight from the Bible or from the Christian religion. Therefore, I free myself of the obligation to be Christ-like, and replace it with the will to be Christ-like; regardless of whether there’s a God, Christ, Spirit, whatever, or not. As collateral, I make a bloody sacrifice of apologetics, cliques, politics, elitism, belief, and religion.
I suppose I should end with this quote; it might summarize why I cannot continue to believe in God through all of this: "The tragedy of self-reflection is that I can never be the person I reflect upon. I am not the performer, but a member of the audience. Yet, at the same time, I am the performer, and am responsible for his actions. That I am aware of this - this unfair obligation - is the tragedy." Of course, I'm always open for religious and philosophical discussion, and I'll be more than happy to contribute to conversations, and attend Bible studies and things like that when I am invited. But I'm too calloused to take a personal committal obligation to the ‘legal’ ins and outs of this theology, or the cliquish behaviors it entails, and if you're expecting me to, then you might as well just leave me alone.
In conclusion, thanks for reading all of that. I haven't done a long, comprehensive writing like this in a long time. Please let me know your thoughts, your complaints, your contentions, condemnations, disappointments, and all of that other stuff. I can take it from you; I’m a big boy.
"It is bad religion to deify doctrines and creeds. While indispensible to religious life, doctrines and creeds are only so as signposts. Love alone is the hitching post. Doctrines, let's not forget, supported slavery and segregation; some still support keeping women in their places, and gays and lesbians in limbo. Moreover, doctrines divide, while compassion can only unite. In other words, religious folk; all our lives have both to recover tradition...and to recover from it. "
-- William Sloane Coffin
--James Elliott
Let me begin by saying this: I wasn't raised in a Christian home. But, since I was very young, my idea of religion was inherently flawed. In all of my interactions with Christians, Sunday School teachers, Youth leaders, pastors, friends, the idea was that a belief is the same as knowledge. Objective knowledge, to be more specific. And at the time, I accepted that – for the longest time, it seemed obvious that God was something that one could say "I know God exists, without a shadow of doubt." I fondly remember a time when religion was a simple thing; you either believed or you didn't, and if you weren't sure, then you probably didn’t believe. You had to be certain, and I quote, "beyond the shadow of doubt." This was one of my youth minister’s idioms. He's a really good guy – what Christ you see left in me after this is because of his guidance. That's why this is going to hurt.
I don't believe in God anymore – or rather, I can't. There have been times all throughout my life where I've wondered why I, or others believed in God. What is the point of belief – what did it accomplish? I think that if it's for some extrinsic (or external) reward, the belief becomes shallow – it becomes a self-serving endeavor: “What can associating with this belief do for me?” If it's for an intrinsic (internal) reward, then it's noble, yes, but it loses any effect when you attempt to share it. Intrinsic rewards are necessarily subjective ["pertaining to or characteristic of an individual," or "placing excessive emphasis on one's own moods, attitudes, opinions, etc.; unduly egocentric"]. Extrinsic rewards are supposed to be objective [“not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased,” or “intent upon or dealing with things external to the mind rather than with thoughts or feelings,” or "of or pertaining to something that can be known, or to something that is an object or a part of an object; existing independent of thought or an observer as part of reality."]. I didn't want my belief in God to be a simple matter of "I don't want to go to Hell," or even that "I want to go to Heaven." That idea seemed pathetic to me, that we would feel so pessimistically negative about our own state of physical existence, so that we could no longer find any real meaning in anything here; it was always about looking forward to Heaven. On the surface, it looks poetic: as Paul puts it, “I count all things as loss for the sake of knowing Christ.” But in actuality, it was sadly ironic in that our very state of physical existence was supposed to be God-breathed, God-ordained, God-created. No, I wanted it to be... different than that. The Truth, yes, but a hidden one – I wanted it to be the Narrow Gate it was made out to be. I wish I could put it simpler.
And why would I want Christianity to be a matter of subjectivity? Of aesthetic; or passion? It was simple: I had seen what Christianity is viewed as. It seems so condemning. Vocal Christians spewing condemnations, demanding outright war against Islamic States in the Middle East; Churches left and right endorsing a no tolerance campaign against homosexuality, abortion, and many other things that are condemned in the Holy Bible – and even some that are endorsed by it (like the separation of Church and State). It all seemed like the death of Civil Liberty, and for what reason? My original hope was that if I could explain Christianity as an aesthetic choice, as a matter of subjective passion, we would drop our pride in our beliefs, which insist we maintain an inspiring, mature, Christ-like level of deep humility – we would lose our need, and our will, to condemn others (intentionally or not) for their differences that make them who they are. Yes, those differences may sometimes be condemned by Scripture, but other things, such as unconditional love, are held in much higher importance by these divine laws – from the very words of Christ himself. Unconditional love is the key – how many of us can say we can love unconditionally?
But no, this Christianity of passion and love that I sought after was not the Christianity I was taught to accept. This was nothing more than a collection of political and social ideas – prejudices by which to judge others, with Jesus' name signed to it as if it were all His idea. Coming to church meant you were subjected to those judgmental stances. It was about what other people expected of you; how they expected you to act, speak, vote, and believe. Not merely what to believe, but how to believe and apply that belief. Or at least, that's how it felt to me – I always felt pressured while I was in church. Some of the pressure was external – things like being pressured into making decisions for Christ, praying in front of groups, being a leader, etc. Some of the pressure was internal – trying to really watch my actions and words so that they'd appear in a way that was acceptable to the surroundings. I hated these pressures – it seemed like I had to put on a show, or hide my true self, just to go to church. The church was not first and foremost a place for reflection, contemplation, guidance, comfort, or even acceptance, but a medium in which to purport an elitist pro-Levitical Law social (and political to a small degree) standard. And by you having a Christian belief, and associating with Christ, you were expected to adhere strictly to those same politically conservative beliefs as well – no exceptions. This wasn’t about loving God, and loving others; this was far more akin to blackmail than anything.
If you don't believe me, here, I ask this: just how many Christians do you know that do not vote strictly Republican? How many Christians do you know that vote liberal, in favor of equal civil rights, or peace?
And I was spending time defending this belief, with these unspoken injustices! This is the reason why Christianity is no longer appealing. This is why the evangelical efforts of Christians are starting to become ineffective. This is why people want to distance themselves from God. It’s because Christians are so willing to associate God with ideals directly counter-intuitive to the message Christ taught, especially within a governmental context. We're not interested in God – we're interested in purporting Old Testament morality. What interest in God we had at this point was that He was the extrinsic reward – not something distant to look forward to, nothing more. I distinctly remember many sermons on how, compared to the promise of Heaven, this world doesn't matter at all. No; things like love, peace, and respect didn't truly matter in the long run. People didn’t matter in the long run, unless they knew how truly horrible they were so that they’d accept Christ. It wasn't really a success until you made someone feel like a failure for being who they were – for doing what they thought was right.
I find it oddly hypocritical, that these people would miss so much of what Jesus says. Sure, we may know His parables front and back, and have a few good interpretations of each of them up our sleeves, but we could still miss so much of it. It may not be intentional, but it doesn’t occur to us that Jesus could be speaking about us as well – not just the Pharisees. Or we might hear a sermon on Jesus walking on the water, and having Peter step out of the boat, and there will be some grand moral or ethical lesson involved with it about how we need to change our lives for Jesus. As if we were living the worst, meaningless lives of sin imaginable, as if it were a comfort, and outside of that was God ("Come to church!"). Not a single thought was given, or entertained, to this metaphorical boat being the Church itself, or what a little self-reflection could do to enhance these messages to apply to our own lives, or even that the change had anything to do with one's approach to Christianity. Or what one could be as a Christian through it. There is an almost sickening dissonance in the way many Christians live; the balance between what they say, and what they associate with – not that there isn’t in the way I live, there certainly is, but I’m not playing a Jesus card in order to purport myself as morally superior.
Is it about serving and pleasing God - that is to say, showing humility through selfless love while on Earth, so that people would not see you, but rather, the Christ in you? Or is it rather about appeasing yourself, your parents, your ministers, or whoever, by hanging out with Christian friends, wearing your Jesus t-shirts, and losing all sense of individuality by adhering to a clique dictated less by the words of Jesus than by the association with Jesus? It’s kind of easy to love unconditionally when you’re surrounding yourself with people just like you. There are no conditions to have to work to love, then. And then you condemn everyone who is different, saying that it’s “love.” Love seems to be the “in” thing, in concept, but is it acted out? We wear our “Love is the Movement,” shirts, we write love on our arms, and while it may seem very loving to us, it’s very excluding to the people we think we’re trying to reach out to. Don’t forget 1 John 4:18, where it says "There is no love in fear?" All we're doing is alienating what we insist is God's creation, for our own political and social gains. Do you believe God created a round world, and all its inhabitants? Or do you believe that God just created the United States and Christians? If the former, then why wouldn’t you truly strive for peace, understanding, and the conditions that unconditional love requires you to love through? If the latter, continue as such (though scripture doesn’t agree with you).
And no, you may not necessarily do these things directly – I admit, they’re general, and I can only speak from my own vantage point. You may not be the one going out to abortion clinics, funerals, war rallies, or the Gay Pride parade holding your big picket signs with the harshest of Biblical condemnations on them. And no, you may not be the guy speaking out against diversity or differences in belief, race, sexual preference, etc. You may actually be very loving and caring, in person, but do you support these actions? Be careful before you answer. It shows in the company you keep and the conversations you have, and in the political and social stances you have. Throughout my life, people have tried to impress upon me an importance of adhering to a respectable morality by showing me that I'm being watched by my superiors – or looked up to, being expected to set the example. Well, I'm watching and paying attention to you people who wear your Christianity like a badge, who find yourselves not only being looked up to as an example in daily life, but in the Church as well. You would do well to watch carefully what you say about people different than you. You prioritize according to the prejudices your Bible contains that put you in the best light. Your actions speak louder than any words you may tell me in private conversation. I know full well, these are just words to you. This life doesn't matter; not compared to Heaven, at least. I tried to identify for so long with this worldview, thinking it to be the correct way to live (after all, you have all set the example for me), but I hated who I had become. This is what drove me away, initially. That's what caused the first little slice of cynicism to creep in.
At that point, I had lost my trust in most Christians; I didn’t want to be known as one, I didn’t want to associate with them. That’s not to say that I didn’t – I just didn’t want to. For a while, I hated myself even more, so I set out to figure out exactly why I felt this way. I started to really study things, then. In my naive attempts to justify Christianity despite the ironic condemnations thereof, I eventually came to Christian apologetics. I found myself unable to completely trust other Christians. Loving them? Yes. But not trusting them. I was highly suspicious, so I latched on to the springboard I received from evangelical training I took while I was in High School. What I sought after couldn't be solved by talking to people I could barely trust anymore. They had unintentionally burned that bridge when I adhered to the thought, and hated myself. I knew something was wrong. I looked into philosophy. For a while, I defended Christianity. I engaged in religious and philosophical debate on a regular basis. I might've made some good points in favor of Christianity, but I didn’t make the mistake of not listening to other people and their arguments.
I started looking deeper into the reasons why one believes in God, from a philosophical view. I learned that this extrinsic reward that Christianity suggests (i.e. Heaven as an afterlife) is a contrived substitute for the purpose(s) of Christianity; the idea is just there to motivate you to conform. It's not only a substitute for what we would call the meaning of life, but also a substitute for what Jesus was talking about. All of these different purposes we arbitrarily attribute to something that has no accessibly inherent or immediately obvious purpose, like God, aren't effective at all in these exchanges – and that’s not even getting into what different denominations and sects of Christianity push! These purposes are only effective to us, only in so far as our passion, dedication, and motivation (however corrupted it may be at this point) can fuel us in our attempts to justify our own beliefs. And, no matter how passionate or dedicated you are, the person you're talking to isn't going to be even remotely compelled to believe you unless they already so much as slightly lean toward that opinion on the matter themselves. For instance, if they live in an area where belief in God is the standard, or at least the majority, then I’m sure the idea isn’t going to sound outlandish or offensive to them and they’ll feel more inclined to believe just to fit in.
The problem with these exchanges, and a biased approach to them, is in that God is not objectively knowable. Believing "beyond a shadow of doubt," is impossible beyond the desires of an individual. But don't mistake that as me making a statement about the entirety of human knowledge (or epistemology). I'm only talking about God here, since God is a matter of belief and not a matter of fact (if it were a matter of fact, then everyone would believe by default, and there would be no purpose to evangelism at all). The only way that God could be a matter of fact is if God was within our sense perception. And while some would argue that God is within sense perception, I say otherwise. If God is within the sense perception of very fallible, very small humans like us, then I ask you: just how big do you think God is? The assertion that you can know that God exists, beyond all doubt, is in effect, blasphemy. Christianity holds faith as one of the three linchpins of its belief (Next to hope and love, according to I Cor. 13:11-13). But if you say you "know beyond the shadow of doubt," it's not really faith at all, is it? What a worthless belief that is, devoid of any power and inspiration it may have had before! But that's not to say you cannot, or should not believe in God. We'll come back to that in a moment.
That may not be convincing enough for you, though. Let me expound on what I mean by that. Not only could it be considered blasphemy to be absolutely certain that God exists, but it's an epistemological problem as well. This whole 'epistemology' thing is kind of hard to grasp, anyway. How do we define our epistemology? Usually, in order for something to be accepted as objectively known, it has to be reliably observable, testable, and repeatable – free of any and all bias. That doesn't mean it has to be empirical, or physical, by the way: Love exists, because we can observe love; we can test love; we can repeat love. We can't quantify it, of course, and we can't take a picture of love, but we can be certain that love exists. [For more information on this distinction, I suggest watching this video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wX_W1BB_0M - it puts it as "injunction, apprehension, and confirmation." But, it’s the same thing.] The way to get out of this vicious circle of thought, this hypocrisy of words you attribute to yourself, is to simply admit you could be wrong. Admit Christianity as a subjective aesthetic, and no one can challenge your faith. However, the backlash from that is that you forfeit your rights to condemn others, or to tell others that they’re going to be subjected to divine wrath for not doing what you say. Could you stand to lose that, for the sake of humility? Or, rather, I should say, for the sake of reverence toward God? Do me a favor; think on that, and get back to me.
There is absolutely nothing about God that adheres to our epistemology, without the help of obvious biases such as subjective interpretation (which does render God observable, testable, and repeatable, but only if one wants to see things in this specific way - you create your reality around your opinions, not the other way around), and possibly even imagination. (That's not intended to be pejorative, by the way; I'm being serious. The process of imagining something that is so much greater than us is a truly humbling endeavor. Especially once we get set on something and say, “Bigger.” It puts things into perspective, and can be very life-changing. The process of imagination should be rewarded for its insight value.) Though, biased interpretations of observations don't constitute any objective proof of God. Our objective truths come from repeated unbiased observation, in fact. If 100 people of different backgrounds did the same experiment and come out with different results (with similar ones for similar backgrounds, beliefs, etc) it's probably biased. If they all come out with the same, or very similar, results (excluding outliers, of course), it's probably not. This is what separates our scientific laws and theories from myths, by the way. In order for something to be considered objective, there has to be a process of an injunction - you can't look for evidence to back up the conclusion, you have to figure out a conclusion that fits the evidence.
Of course, if there is no evidence for something, then it’s a good idea to not go with that conclusion. Though, right here many people would say “but you can’t disprove it, therefore it must be true.” I don’t have to disprove it. The burden of proof is on the person making the assertion for the existence of God, in this case. If there’s nothing completely reliable and incontrovertible to lean on in a conclusion for something, especially something of such potential importance as the existence of God, then there’s no reason to go with that choice. From there, apologetics becomes ineffective and shuts down, and becomes part of the ‘religion,’ of Christianity. You feel you must defend God, but you have no passion, no true interest in pursuing the greatness of God. Believe me; I’m speaking from experience here. If I had any sort of high ground on which to give any sort of advice, this would be it: do not let your Christianity become a boring matter of following rules, conforming to the status quo, or stubbornly insisting that Christianity is ‘fact.’ Do not forget the aesthetic, the subject; have some passion in this pursuit! If we notice that something that we're doing isn't working, then we need to stop doing that, and try something else.
Survival of the Fittest isn't an idea that evolutionary biology has a monopoly on. It applies to philosophy, thought, technology, religion, and the development of civilization. This type of civilization that you and I are used to, this way of existence, digitally communicating, is vastly different from others on this earth, for example a primitive tribe in South America. Our languages, social norms, how we eat, what we eat, how we dress, how we act, etc. are all different in our different cultures. We've all got our different ideas on how to live life. And the ones that work are still here. The ones that don't work aren't here anymore. For all we know, there may have been an ancient civilization that thought it was pragmatic to stand naked out in waist deep water in the middle of winter. Those people are dead - our civilizations have survived. It didn't ever have to come about from some divine plan. This is why I am making the decision I am – my desire to above all prove Christianity as being the one true religion has left me emotionless and ineffective in that pursuit. Christianity hangs like a dead weight on my conscience, and what’s left of my heart, and I need it to go away now – my heart is needed elsewhere. The collateral is worth it, in my opinion. For this, at least.
If you were still interested in holding belief in God as objectively true, by this point I have given you no footholds. Except for one, but it is cripplingly counter-intuitive: to insist that the human mind works solely in objective truths, and that all of our opinions are products of deduction. But if the mind does work like this, then there is no such thing as opinion, belief, impulse, passion, prejudice, or emotion at all. Aesthetic wouldn’t exist – as everything would be designed solely with practicality in mind. There would be nothing to make us want to believe in any God or not; nothing to convince us of that, as there wouldn’t be any emotions to play on. Nothing would be personal, or private, but most importantly, there would be no love in the world. Everything would adhere closely to logic and reason, and no one would dare disagree with it - they would have no inclination to at all; no creativity. But, on the other hand, there has to be at least some objective truth, otherwise things go completely in the opposite direction: solipsism, and complete, arbitrary relativism; absolute anarchy of ideas, thought, feelings, understanding and interaction; with no intent on learning, truth, or making any progress in the fields of technology, medicine, literature, communication, science. We would still be in the Stone Age, hitting each other with rocks for sport. But these are very extreme scenarios, which I do not endorse taking seriously.
There is a line between proposing a belief as objectively certain, and proposing a belief as objectively uncertain. That line is where humility is. Religion shouldn’t be considered a matter of absolute subjectivity, or absolute objectivity. We should at least be aware of our own epistemological limits and abilities before making any statements about God’s existence being objectively certain or logically imperative. It’s also a good idea to be aware of what exactly the beliefs we hold say is admirable. To continue with this, I would like to draw attention to the implications of purporting Christianity as objectively true in the guise of 'faith.' This should be my only Søren Kierkegaard quote, but it’s a very effective quote if one comprehends it: "If I am capable of grasping God objectively, I do not believe, but precisely because I cannot do this I must believe. If I wish to preserve myself in faith I must constantly be intent upon holding fast the objective uncertainty, so as to remain out upon the deep, over seventy fathoms of water still preserving my faith.”
From that, I ask: What is admirable about being absolutely certain in a belief that considers faith to be one of its main linchpins?
Whether you believe that God’s existence is objectively true, or not, the very fact that you hold this opinion and others might not proves that it is a subjective choice. In addition, the fact that there’s no way to effectively explain what God is, or provide any reason that one should believe in this God (aside from the aesthetic, which isn’t objective), removes your ability to purport this belief as anything other than a simple opinion. What few logical persuasions that do support this conclusion are just that: persuasions that were intentionally thought out strengthen the standing conclusion. Was there ever an interest in finding out whether God truly exists or not? I think not; apologetics was invented as a means to defend an arbitrary, aesthetic belief. As such, all the arguments in favor of said belief can be boiled down to biased, contrived interpretations of literally anything at all that you can observe. Just what objective effect can these arguments have? A belief predicated on interpretation has no power that can convince anyone else - at least, not in a way that isn't a form of blackmail. It's very similar to the first compelling argument for the Existence of God, which was: "So, you don't believe in God? Well, here's a bayonet up your ass!" This is why Christianity has survived so long in this way: it was the social expectation; the cultural norm - nothing more. Again, you can't look for evidence to back up the conclusion, you have to figure out a conclusion that fits the evidence. It’s just grasping at philosophical straws.
The 'proofs,' one has for a God aren't proof at all unless one specifically wants them to be a proof. You should agree that God is beyond our ability to know with certainty - to comprehend fully. (If you don’t agree, then I think you’ve got some serious issues.) If we can comprehend it, it's not God. The uncertainty is what makes faith powerful. That's what makes it admirable, in the end. What's the point of faith if you know beyond the shadow of a doubt that God exists? “Faith does not offer the least support for a proof of objective truth. Here the ways of men part: if you wish to strive for peace of soul and pleasure, then believe; if you wish to be a devotee of truth, then inquire.” This is the backlash you're getting into. When you exploit a loop-hole in logic to make God's existence logically imperative, you are unknowingly allowing any other random, faith-based claim or opinion to be considered in that same realm of being logically imperative. You don't want that; the association belittles your belief and makes it worthless. [For more information on what I mean here, I suggest you watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdneXwe6Q4o]
That’s the last of my philosophical ramble, here. Take it or leave it. Don’t misunderstand what I mean by going on this route. I’ll say this once: the enemy is not God, or belief in a God. Whether one believes in a God or not is a personal choice and personal choices shouldn't be discouraged. No one can make the decision to truly believe in a God for someone else (I emphasize "truly," in lieu of "I don't want a bayonet up my ass, so I'll say I believe in God"). Rebellion isn’t a goal, here. The enemy is, and always was, the misapplication of those beliefs. What’s virtuous about forcing a belief on someone else, or using it as a standard upon which to judge everyone else on the grounds of morality or ethics? Is the world leader virtuous if he wants to use his power to level a country that has an anti-Christian bias? Or is Fred Phelps virtuous, the man who completely misrepresents the very sine qua non of Christianity as Jesus put it: "The most important [commandment] is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
No, what I was expecting all along to be in and of Christianity has left it. It has become too much of a dogmatic system of rules, and not a personal system of humble passion, with reverence toward God. For this reason, in order to pursue the qualities of Christianity that I find worthy of pursuing, I am leaving it. As I said, my heart is needed elsewhere now – my effort is needed elsewhere; my love is. The simplest way to put it is that I just don’t believe in God. It’s not that I don’t want to, or that I find it stupid to do so. It’s just that I can’t believe. I don’t have the strength to stretch myself in two different directions for what this belief requires. I have heard Christianity described as a backwards life. I find it very, very backwards (or at least, very ironic) that in order to truly follow its teachings (which, I hold the words of Jesus to be of utmost importance here), I must pitilessly murder my association with them. I have other things to attend to, to be honest, and I simply don't care to know if there is a God or not; much less to spend the time following one. I don’t need to believe in a God to gain insight from the Bible or from the Christian religion. Therefore, I free myself of the obligation to be Christ-like, and replace it with the will to be Christ-like; regardless of whether there’s a God, Christ, Spirit, whatever, or not. As collateral, I make a bloody sacrifice of apologetics, cliques, politics, elitism, belief, and religion.
I suppose I should end with this quote; it might summarize why I cannot continue to believe in God through all of this: "The tragedy of self-reflection is that I can never be the person I reflect upon. I am not the performer, but a member of the audience. Yet, at the same time, I am the performer, and am responsible for his actions. That I am aware of this - this unfair obligation - is the tragedy." Of course, I'm always open for religious and philosophical discussion, and I'll be more than happy to contribute to conversations, and attend Bible studies and things like that when I am invited. But I'm too calloused to take a personal committal obligation to the ‘legal’ ins and outs of this theology, or the cliquish behaviors it entails, and if you're expecting me to, then you might as well just leave me alone.
In conclusion, thanks for reading all of that. I haven't done a long, comprehensive writing like this in a long time. Please let me know your thoughts, your complaints, your contentions, condemnations, disappointments, and all of that other stuff. I can take it from you; I’m a big boy.
"It is bad religion to deify doctrines and creeds. While indispensible to religious life, doctrines and creeds are only so as signposts. Love alone is the hitching post. Doctrines, let's not forget, supported slavery and segregation; some still support keeping women in their places, and gays and lesbians in limbo. Moreover, doctrines divide, while compassion can only unite. In other words, religious folk; all our lives have both to recover tradition...and to recover from it. "
-- William Sloane Coffin
--James Elliott