Faith Musings

“I’m kind of searching.”

 “I don’t really think about that stuff.”

“I’m a ‘spiritual person’ – not religious.”

Oh yes – time for another essay.

As a child, I was a curious, open minded mind who continuously absorbed information from school, parents, friends, friend’s parents, neighbors, and so on. Slowly my mind began to fill with images, sensations and experiences; the world around me began to take form and meaning.

When it came to faith and religion, I gobbled up everything I was taught as fact by my school and household. The Bible is true. The Bible has all the answers. God loves me. Jesus died for me to void all the bad stuff I do. Every word from every mouth was true, true, true. I didn’t understand when my friends struggled with their faith, and I didn’t know how to help them “see the light.” I didn’t understand the appeal of Hedonism. I had never read the Koran, and I didn’t know what made Allah any different from Adonai.

Instead of embracing my ignorance, I became very curious … but quickly discovered very few people in my immediate circle had much information on other religions or religious texts, or at least few were willing to share. I got the impression that other faiths and their writings were in some way bad, and that by reading them I would taint my spirit somehow or that my Christian identity would be marred by the stains of their dark and evil powers. As in the Garden of Eden, the tree of knowledge seemed to be forbidden.

My mind was quickly filled with simplified derogative summaries of those other people. Mormons were crazy and wanted to be aliens. Muslims were also nuts and felt obligated to kill people. Jews were bitter because they missed the boat. Buddhists and Hindus were uneducated and had no logic in their philosophies. New Agers were basically leftover hippies.  For a long time I felt as though I was taught to pity these poor “other” people who had rejected the message of Christ. Lucky for me I was going to heaven, but how sad that they were all going to burn, burn, burn.  This mentality was thankfully short lived. As my own faith deepened and matured as I grew up, my curiosity expanded and matured as well.

Traveling to Thailand, I saw what it was like to live the life of a Buddhist in a culture where Buddhism was standard. I had the opportunity to teach English to a class of monks and serve a small orphanage.  I saw that these people were not stupid, and I noticed things in their faith that were beautiful; their teachings were basic, but they tried to answer similar questions; what is this life, and how are we to live it?  I was in Thailand as a missionary for Christ.  My goal, as I understood it, was to enlighten the people I met with the good news of the gospel.  In the time I spent there, however, I found myself changed and influenced deeply by the faith of Buddhists, Christians, and even Atheists.  I drank in the beauty of the land, people, and culture and widened my own life perspective and reality in a breathtaking way.

Much later, I traveled to Jordan and Israel and encountered Jews, Muslims, and Christians in the Middle East.  The majority were lovely people, searching like me for answers in a broken world, taking hope in their faith and traditions, some with vastly more devotion and love than I had ever before encountered.

"Seek first to understand, then to be understood." - Stephen R. Covey

(Who is this Covey guy? A Christian, right? Nope, he’s a Mormon.)  I wish with all my heart that people followed this principle; an attitude like this embodies such humility, such respect, such love – it could easily bring me to tears if I allowed it.  In recent years I feel as though I find the most ‘Christian’ things in non-Christian places, and like many for a long while I was disgusted and angry with organized religion as a whole.  (Why is it fury is so much more comforting than sadness and despair?)  It is a challenge not to choke and suffocate on the failures of the church as an institution; it is a daily struggle to keep my enthusiastic inner cynic quiet.

Not to mention the painful friction of evangelism I am still learning to embrace.  On one hand, I believe I have this gift, this faith, this beautiful knowledge that I want everyone to share with me.  When people don’t want that gift, I feel obligated to somehow sell them on it, like one might sell insurance on a DirecTV dish.  (Convince them it’s useful, they need it, and they’ll regret not taking it later.)  But then I remember that faith is not for sale, and I’m not trying to earn a twisted spiritual commission for padding church numbers.  It is free to accept and free to reject, and there is peace to be found in that fact.

“Preach the gospel at all times. When necessary, use words.” – attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi

In the end, it all boils down to a choice; one which leads to a lifetime of choices.  I choose to believe the gospels; I choose to alter my behavior in accordance with the teachings of the church.  I freely admit that this choice is part logic, part emotion, and part hope.  I know and accept that I could be wrong, and acknowledge the pitiful holes in my understanding.  My prayer is to love others in the way we have been called, to be a living witness to the hope I have accepted, and always be quick to listen first.