As an agnostic, I've long battled with the notion of God. I was raised Roman Catholic, instilled with the belief that God cannot only see everything we do but hear every thought. In those thoughts and actions we are judged, which means, by implication, we are heard. If we are heard, why is there little to no divine intervention? Why are there no apparent miracles? Have we been abandoned? Have we been forgotten?
As an agnostic, all I have are questions. While the concept of God has always been alluring it has never felt solid, just something I reach for and fall through. We can turn on the television and see atrocity after atrocity. Reading the news, reading history, learning what we're capable of does not reinforce the concept. If anything, it contradicts it. We can listen to friends and family say terrible things. We can watch with our own eyes insufferable actions that we can do nothing to stop. Why am I drawn to thoughts of a higher power? Why do I think that my actions have unfathomable consequences? Is it guilt? Is it a primordial sensation I can't shake, akin to feeling hunted by a predator?
Day after day, thought after thought, these are questions I have to admit I don't know the answer to. I don't know if there's life after death; I haven't died. I haven't spoken with angels or a lost friend. I don't know what came before me, other than what others have written. I don't know what will happen after me. As a child, I once believed the universe ceased to exist outside the room I was within. When someone left the house, I wasn't sure that they didn't just disappear. I imagined they didn't, but at the same time, I doubted they were really shopping or visiting family or going next door; how could I really know for certain?
I own a Bible. I've read it. I've read religious texts from around the world, past and present. I went to church school every Sunday. I've prayed almost every night since grade school. I was baptized and confirmed, yet I still don't understand kneeling to a man, confessing to a man. If we are all sinners by nature, what good is an oath from one man to another? I've met worshipers that were bad, atheists that were good, and vice versa. How can this be, when communion and the gospel are supposed to elevate us to a higher plane?
I don't understand having to attend the same ceremony every week to be heard from an all-seeing, all-knowing being. Can't God hear my thoughts at anywhere I go? Can't God forgive what I regret? I once saw a priest slap a friend at confirmation rehearsal so bad that my friend's face was red for the remainder of the time we were there. That priest was found to have pilfered donations and worse. How can one trust such an organization? Does a robe and followers make the priest holier than the faithful follower?
Faith is a cunning bitch of a word. For one to have faith, one removes all doubt. Questions no longer matter. Reasons no longer matter. As a lover of science and philosophy, I don't understand how questions or reasons could ever not matter. Einstein once said, "God does not play dice with the universe," and in that, there is true wisdom: for there to be a creator there must be rules, an order in which all things follow. Humanity does not create those rules; we decipher them.
As with alien life and ghosts, I simply can't have faith without proof. I must remain a skeptic that wants to believe that existence is more than a mistake or happenstance, that answers may come if the right questions are posed. As an agnostic, I accept nothing less than truth, be it now or in death.
As an agnostic, all I have are questions. While the concept of God has always been alluring it has never felt solid, just something I reach for and fall through. We can turn on the television and see atrocity after atrocity. Reading the news, reading history, learning what we're capable of does not reinforce the concept. If anything, it contradicts it. We can listen to friends and family say terrible things. We can watch with our own eyes insufferable actions that we can do nothing to stop. Why am I drawn to thoughts of a higher power? Why do I think that my actions have unfathomable consequences? Is it guilt? Is it a primordial sensation I can't shake, akin to feeling hunted by a predator?
Day after day, thought after thought, these are questions I have to admit I don't know the answer to. I don't know if there's life after death; I haven't died. I haven't spoken with angels or a lost friend. I don't know what came before me, other than what others have written. I don't know what will happen after me. As a child, I once believed the universe ceased to exist outside the room I was within. When someone left the house, I wasn't sure that they didn't just disappear. I imagined they didn't, but at the same time, I doubted they were really shopping or visiting family or going next door; how could I really know for certain?
I own a Bible. I've read it. I've read religious texts from around the world, past and present. I went to church school every Sunday. I've prayed almost every night since grade school. I was baptized and confirmed, yet I still don't understand kneeling to a man, confessing to a man. If we are all sinners by nature, what good is an oath from one man to another? I've met worshipers that were bad, atheists that were good, and vice versa. How can this be, when communion and the gospel are supposed to elevate us to a higher plane?
I don't understand having to attend the same ceremony every week to be heard from an all-seeing, all-knowing being. Can't God hear my thoughts at anywhere I go? Can't God forgive what I regret? I once saw a priest slap a friend at confirmation rehearsal so bad that my friend's face was red for the remainder of the time we were there. That priest was found to have pilfered donations and worse. How can one trust such an organization? Does a robe and followers make the priest holier than the faithful follower?
Faith is a cunning bitch of a word. For one to have faith, one removes all doubt. Questions no longer matter. Reasons no longer matter. As a lover of science and philosophy, I don't understand how questions or reasons could ever not matter. Einstein once said, "God does not play dice with the universe," and in that, there is true wisdom: for there to be a creator there must be rules, an order in which all things follow. Humanity does not create those rules; we decipher them.
As with alien life and ghosts, I simply can't have faith without proof. I must remain a skeptic that wants to believe that existence is more than a mistake or happenstance, that answers may come if the right questions are posed. As an agnostic, I accept nothing less than truth, be it now or in death.
