Oh, Good Lord.

Okay -- I've received a few e-mails about the "support of religion" I apparently implied by posting a photo of the church sign. No one was the least bit nasty --in fact, the e-mails have been 110% supportive. But there's a perception in the circles we lefties travel in that sometimes, faith is not something to discuss at all. Normally I agree -- faith is a deeply personal thing for me, as well. Still, I want to explain, as best I can, the role faith plays in my life and interactions with others.

I'm not a superstitious, crazy person. I believe very strongly in science, empirical evidence, peer-reviewed research, and whatnot. Still, I have an unexplainable fraction in the makeup of my personality that I identify as "faith." It doesn't strongly correlate with any other notion of "faith" that I've ever heard described and understood, but it does remain important to me, even if it never consciously trumps all my other reasonable faculties. This inexplicable fraction of my psyche does not rule my thoughts and behaviours, but I suspect it does indeed inform them, to some degree.

Like so many kids raised in the south, I had a religious upbringing, to an extent (e.g., I was, for several years, forced to regularly attend Sunday School, though rarely the main Sunday services), in the Southern Baptist church. I never bought into much of it, even as a young kid, because from the very start, I saw the rampant hypocrisy in the behavior of the adults in the church who subscribed to this theology, and yet were so highly regarded within the church, regardless of their "offenses" (e.g., several church deacons and one associate pastor left the church in a short period of time, over allegations of adulterous liaisons... these incidents weren't clear to me at the time, of course, but it wasn't difficult to figure out that they had, in fact, done something so horribly wrong as to be shunned by the congregation).

I even attended the services held by my paternal grandparents (notably not attended by my parents) -- my grandfather served as preacher (not ordained, AFAIK) for a backwoods, one-room Lutheran church in Ulysses, Kentucky for some years; my grandmother played a badly out-of-tune upright piano, to lead the hymns. I was freaked out when the "testifying" led to "speaking in tongues," on the few times I attended their services, but otherwise, I saw nothing abnormal or pathological about the way these people communed, and communicated with one another.

I came by my belief in a God quite honestly, though... at first, I followed the teachings of my "betters," more or less unquestionably, until age 11. It was then that I asked my Sunday School teacher, "If the sixth Commandment says, 'Thou Shalt Not Kill,' how is it okay for us to support killing people in the electric chair, or in Vietnam?" His fumbling, dissembling response convinced me then and there, at that tender age (as selection error-prone as it was), that I could not look to my church for meaningful moral guidance. Ever since that time, I've had a distrust of organized religion, and have since sought out an "independent course of spiritual study."

What I primarily came to understand about what regular involvement in the mainstream church meant, in the larger picture, very early on, was that it was primarily a vehicle for extra-spiritual social interactions (both for me, and my one religious parent or step-parent). It meant making friends who didn't, honestly, give much of a shit about Jesus, but liked to play tag at recess. It meant that I got invited to more birthday parties. It meant that as a Cub Scout, I could advance in merit badges (or whatever they were called) for the ridiculous justification of my attending church every Sunday.

I know some of my views on religion don't easily gel with others who share many, if not most of my other socioeconomic and political beliefs (on both the "believers" and the "non-believers" sides), and the fact that I'm a southern boy probably compounds the misunderstandings regarding my personal spirituality. That's why I undertook this posting.

In my mind, spiritual matters are deeply, and completely personal concerns -- don't ask, don't tell (unless you're trying to consensually enhance some one's understanding of what you believe, as I am, here). In my mind, healthy personal spiritual beliefs should not overtly impact other aspects of one's otherwise "normal life," because those beliefs should be held closely and privately enough as to not present a concern to those who regularly interact with you. If one spends a significant amount of time every day talking about an invisible, omnipotent being and/or the son of an omnipotent being, this person probably don't have a spiritually healthy life, IMO. At the same time, in a sincerely spiritually-healthy person, whatever beliefs one holds will also inform and integrate into one's own philosophy, in such a way as to express themselves without needing to call others' attention to the fact that such is the case. If there is one thing I believe, it's this: If God exists, He/She doesn't give a fuck what anyone else thinks about how you perceive God, or how God wants you to live. That's between you and God, and fuck everyone else's opinions, period, end-of-story. Any sincere "path to God" will be where you find it -- it will NOT find you at gunpoint or browbeating, I assure you. I don't want to convince you that my beliefs should be YOUR beliefs, because I think these beliefs are (and should be) as individual and unique as fingerprints, or DNA. Yes, commonalities will exist, but rigid constructs cannot account for the true diversity of a God that explains our continuing existence, IMO.

I presently identify as an agnostic, believing that if there IS a God, I don't think humans can possibly hope to understand or explain Him/Her in a way that will have significant bearing on our everyday lives, beyond some very basic ground rules. God does conceivably exist, in my mind, but trying to understand His/Her actions and motives is like an ant trying to figure out why what you or I do what we do. Still, I try not to belittle others for their sometimes (IMO) laughable beliefs (not always succeeding -- I often ridicule my mom for being a "crazed fundie Texan," for example, but I love her, just the same), especially when I feel that they are honestly believed, and not simply a facade of belief affected to manipulate others (those whose beliefs are so obviously superficial receive my maximum scorn and derision).

I believe that I'm a deeply moral, ethical person, but my morals and ethics do not derive exclusively from God and/or His/Her proponents -- but more from simple (yet congruent with every significant religious text ever written), universal rules such as, "Treat others as you would wish to be treated," and "Be conservative in your judgement of others, since you'll never, in this life, have the Big Picture, as God might see it," and "Take care of those less fortunate than you, because you are truly blessed to have whatever you have, and should share what you can with others who are not so blessed, because you could just as easily be bereft of those blessings, and you would then hope others would look upon you with this perspective." And, this is not due to some reward/punishment schema that I've been dogmatized into -- as one former supervisor once explained to me, "Hey, it's your job," the implication being that one shouldn't expect praise or damnation for doing the best job you know how to do. You do what you do, and you do your best, and if that's not good enough for God, well, fuck God, IMO. I have faith that if there is some afterlife (something I seriously doubt), my God will judge me fairly, and YES, I think it DOES matter what I do in my life, in that respect... but as for hard and fast rules, I doubt God has a guidebook, or "mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines" that we would substantially understand in such a binary, mortal manner.

The people "of faith" I worry about are the ones that John W. Dean describes as "double highs" in his book, Conservatives Without Conscience. There's a subset of "faithful" Christians (who are as amoral as any that have ever existed; read the book to learn the interesting, yet frightening pathological details of these folx) who commit the most atrocious, unforgivable evil under the belief that no matter what they do in this life, they will be forgiven in the next, via their faith in Christ. In the hills, we used to call such people "backsliders," but really, this class encompasses some pure, unadulterated EVIL, in some cases, and such folx are probably Biblical-justifiably susceptible to public stoning as a result. I've known two such folx, and I praise God that they never ran for POTUS. Not only might they actually win the office, but within days of taking office, they'd likely start a global thermonuclear war, simply because they could, and it "seemed the right thing to do," for some reason no one but they could possibly understand. Remind you of anyone? :-/

I'm not perfect, but for the overwhelming majority of my life, I have lived by simple moral tenets, and have managed to live a rich, rewarding, blessed life -- I've known hardship, but I have yet to know true hunger, homelessness, pestilence, epidemic or war. Whether the life I have lived and the tenets I follow are in any way empirically connected, I can't say, but I would choose to live this way, without regard to any potential mysterious spiritual consequences. My conscience would not allow otherwise, and I have trouble believing in a God who would be in conflict with my conscience. I don't ever want to cause harm to anyone, intentionally or unintentionally, unless it is absolutely unavoidable to preserve my own life or significant well-being, or that of those about whom I care deeply. That's pretty much my "prime directive," although it doesn't address my relative inaction as regards global genocide, etc. There are many injustices in the world I feel ill-equipped to engage, but I seek, and am open to any enlightenment that might improve my chances for effectiveness in these matters, always.

As for those who cause me harm, I offer generous forgiveness in cases where the harm was obviously or reasonably unintentional; for those who cause me harm intentionally, and unjustifiably, I have much less tolerance. That is perhaps my biggest spiritual failing, and the quandary I cannot satisfactorily address on my own: How do I ethically respond to those who knowingly intend to (and do) cause me harm for no apparent or justifiable reason? This might well be a question that devout people everywhere ask themselves. I'm not sure that their ultimate answers are any closer to "revealed truth," as it were, than any musings I have had on the subject. Honestly, I am not untroubled by this dilemma, and I intend to explore it further with people of faith, and those who would identify otherwise.

Anyway, what I want to impress upon those reading here is this: I have no doubt that 95% of those who're involved in organized religion in any visible, public way are corrupt, manipulative pricks, who could not give a shit about any kind of spirituality, let alone one's fellow man. "You will know them by their fruits" -- one can use that as a thumbnail measure of any self-sanctified figure.

It's the other 5% that I have met, lived with, and come to appreciate and understand that causes me not to reject out-of-hand, the idea of spirituality as being a potential major, positive influence in some people's lives. It's probably not something that could factor into everyone's lives, and spirituality is certainly not something that's a "one size fits all" solution, but it's also not always a bigoted, bad, anachronistic, crazy, superstitious thing, either, no matter how often it might, in practice, be. I only know that I have learned valuable insights from some of "the 5%," and I feel I have more to learn from others like them (and, I may have found an open door, just recently). I will not be handling snakes, or wearing a plasticised hair helmet on TeeBee, begging Jeebus for forgiveness for "my sins" in either the past or future -- this much is safe to say. Yet I am open to the positive influences and ideas that thoughtful people "of faith" have to bring to the marketplace of ideas. The negative, whacko exclusionary ideas are quickly identifiable, and can be summarily rejected as such... but my cautionary statement is to not write off ALL people with spiritual convictions and concerns as crazy, superstitious, unreasonable people. It simply isn't true, even if it might be true in a vast majority of cases. If nothing else, try to see beyond these people's "faith," and listen to what they can express to you, otherwise. Know them by their fruits, and as is the case with the godless heathens (heh), you will profit by knowing those who bear good fruit. This, I assure you.
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