A good friend of mine has a bee in his bonnet about faith, what it is and what it isn’t. Mostly what it isn’t. It isn’t rational. It isn’t based on facts or anything demonstrably true. Not, he concedes, that matters of faith are wrong, simply that they can’t be proven. If they could, they wouldn’t, by definition, be faith.
I’m going to write this as if I have faith in something, as if I believe in god. I do, actually, believe in something that might as well be called god. Wayne Dyer, in his latest book, calls it intention (although a better word for his thesis would be potential), but even this is too anthropomorphized for my logical mind. My beliefs are physical and metaphysical, based upon the patterns and conservation of energy, the fluidity of space and time, the overlapping of moments and dimensions. I believe in destiny as an expression of points on a timeline and in free will as a navigator of dimensional branches and alternative realities. I believe in the soul as the energy that keeps our awareness and personae intact as we exercise that will, that animates us like light through a film reel as we flip between the milliseconds of our existence. I believe that time is an illusion, that every instant from the big bang to the heat death of the universe exists simultaneously, and that one single soul (or Soul, if you prefer) reincarnates itself billions, trillions, countless numbers of times, into every human, alien, dog, and dolphin that exists, ever existed, and ever will exist, to experience every possible aspect of life and of itself . . . and if you took the soul of every human, alien, dog, and dolphin that exists, ever existed, and ever will exist and joined them together, you would have something approaching the “mind of god.”
But that’s just me.
What I have no faith in is the Christian bible, which is so biased, inconsistent, oddly compiled, and badly translated that you could equally well center a religion on my ninth-grade Spanish homework. Most of my hostility for the bible comes from its politicization throughout world history, but especially today in the United States. (Politicization of anything almost always arises from fear, hatred, insecurity, and mistrust; indeed, these motivations are the underpinnings of both modern evangelical Christianity and the Republican Party, which is presumably why these groups are natural bedfellows.)
At the center of the furor is the insistence of certain individuals and groups of accepting the bible as literal truth and selectively prosecuting ancient Hebrew health code violations, while ignoring the central messages of love and acceptance found in the new testament. According to the bible, the “sin” Jesus preached against most often was hypocrisy, although this fact is ironically lost on the hypocrites who use his legacy to hurt, divide, oppress, and control the behavior of other people. (Some might find it shocking that Jesus never made a reference to homosexuality or the right to bear arms.) Those who read the bible in the context of history know that Jesus, if he existed at all, was a radical, revolutionary, liberal activist who spoke against the codification of harsh religious laws into civil laws. This is what got him murdered two thousand years ago, and this is what would certainly get him murdered today by those who profess to be his biggest fans.
Resultant from the perversion of Christ’s values by what often appears to be the majority of today’s Christians is the understandable dread and even horror any mention of Jesus or biblical reference brings out in normal, thoughtful people. I have lately been attending Quaker Meetings. Quakers are Christians, but they are so rational and unassuming that I have largely been able to fool myself into thinking they aren’t. There are no Quaker sermons and no religious hierarchy; their meetings consist almost entirely of silent meditation (time I use to reflect on my ideas of god, on being thankful for the good fortune in my life, and on how I can be a better person who makes the world a better place). Every time a Quaker mentions Jesus, I almost jump out of my skin. When a Friend, who is gay, started reading from the bible last week, I felt so oppressed that my head nearly exploded. And yet, it was a message of love and hope, as all Jesus’ messages are. Even viewing the bible as an incomplete historical document or as a work of literature with an odd narrative flow—that is, even if you don’t view it as literal or demonstrable truth—that much is unmistakable.
If Jesus existed, which is by no means certain, then we are all Jesus, because we are all god. We are all Buddha, Mohammed, and Abraham. We are all Hitler. We are all George W. Bush. We are all Madam Curie. We are all Matthew Shepard, who was crucified several years ago in Wyoming for being gay.
That’s what I have faith in. I can’t prove it, but I don’t have to.
