It is hardly possible to overrate the value, for the improvement of human beings, of things which bring them into contact with persons dissimilar to themselves, and with modes of thought and action unlike those with which they are familiar... it is indispensable to be perpetually comparing [one's] own notions and customs with the experience and example of persons in different circumstances."
John Stuart Mill
Scene 1: Don
“You know, you're the first religious person I've met in Canada”
“Really eh? Yeah... well, frankly the West-coast isn't known for being the most churched part of the country, you're not as likely to find as much of a “religious” culture here. Not in the traditional sense anyways.”
Don was from Ireland. Brainwashed, he would say, by the overbearing Catholic church there, and plenty bitter about it. He would be working with me for another couple weeks on the farm. He was a thoughtful and hilariously explicit musician. I loved having him around.
“They lied to me. Out and out. Compromised my primary education by telling me science was wrong because they couldn't make it work with their system. They held fear over our heads to control us when we were kids and it wasn't till i was a teenager that I got the guts together to call it out for all its bullshit. I mean, I get that religion is a way of self-betterment for some people, and i respect that, and, you know, you seem pretty relaxed and open as a religious person, but in my experience that kind has been anything but the norm.”
“Yeah man, I don't know. I can't speak for others, and I guess that's it. We're all on a journey, and for some that has brought them to a fairly static place. Personally, I feel like I've seen too much to paint the world in black and white. For me there's really something about Christianity that I value a lot. I mean, there has to be, but I get it if you don't. I don't know much of your experiences, but I'm guessing your choices and views on life are based on some pretty unique ones, and I can appreciate that.”
“Its dogma I can't stand” he said. “I mean, I was down in Texas a while back and had a fellow tell me to my face that I was going to burn in hell. You know? Because I didn't believe what he did.”
I sighed. “Yeah... that bothers me too, but I've been thinking about that kind of thing. I mean, I don't appreciate the sentiment either, but you know, if we remove ourselves from that kind of 'blind faith,' if you will, you have to kind of admire it, don't you? I mean, whether you're a Islamic extremist with a bomb strapped to your chest or a Bible-beating baptist who won't give on his particular belief system no matter what is propped up in front of him to illuminate its absurdity, its sort-of admirable that both kinds of fundamentalist tolerate the kind of prejudice they do while sticking to their guns. Its sort of amazing. That's real belief isn't it? I think if I'm going to try to understand others' reasons for believing the things they do and the choices they make, that includes the extreme dogmatists, that's all. Its something."
“I don't know” Don answered. “I wouldn't use the word respect. Unless its respect like I respect that doorjam after i got my foot caught in it and got all bruised up. Its a respect based on fear. Fear of the potential for getting hurt. I'll look out for it next time.”
Scene 2: Olivia
“Ok, well, if you don't mind me asking, could you date or marry a girl who wasn't Christian?”
“Could I or would I?”
“Both?”
Olivia was riding in the car with Don and I. Olivia from South Britain. She's come to work at the farm too, and she fits right in. Unlike Don, she doesn't have a religious background. She's just curious about mine. I love being the center of attention, so I let her drill me on whatever she wants. Plus, she's pretty.
“Well, I don't suppose there's any strict rules against it, although there are some bible verses that churches toss around to argue against marrying out. Personally, I think it comes down to the fact that I wouldn't be likely to marry someone who didn't have some similar faith experience because its integral to who I've become, in the same way that I probably wouldn't marry someone who grew up in a different culture or class. I mean, look around you. It happens, but not often. We tend to pair up with those with commonalities. If i was truly in love with someone who didn't believe what I did, I don't know. I haven't been there. If it happened my answer might be different.”
“Yeah, religion shouldn't keep people apart if they want to be together”
Don, despite his cynicism is yet the romantic. (When I first met him he reminded me of Glen Hansard so much that I had to ask if he'd ever met him. He simply answered, “ah yeah, I've met Glen.”)
“Ok but what about this...” Olivia pressed on, “Wouldn't you not want to marry someone outside the church because then you'd believe that she was going to hell while you were going to heaven? Right?”
“Yeah, I don't know...”
“But isn't that right? If you don't believe then you go to hell? And you wouldn't want your wife to go to hell.” Olivia's sincerity makes me want to marry her, a little bit. Maybe she's right.
“Yeah, the rest of the world gets to go down below 'cause they got it wrong” Don confirms.
“What do you believe about that? That's right isn't it? I hope I'm not putting you on the spot too much asking you all this,” Olivia presses.
“Well that's it. I don't know. I mean, the party line is, yes, pretty much what you say. But who makes up these doctrines?” I stumble along “I mean, I get that the church as an institution has to have its belief systems in a row, but personally, my guess is that a lot of Christians will admit that they aren't sure. There really isn't that much in the Bible, if that's what you're basing your doctrine off of, about Hell. Not really that much about afterlife in general, not in a conclusive way. I think there's quite a bit of room to question and not be sure at the end of the day. I don't have a conclusive answer, but since you're asking me, I just don't see it. The idea that there is a streamlined narrow belief set that you have to subscribe to to get out of here without getting burnt, and the rest are screwed because they weren't lucky enough to stumble onto that path- yeah, that doesn't really make sense to me.”
“What's the difference between Faith and Belief?” Olive again. We are almost back to the farm.
Damn good question.
“I don't know that I've given that enough thought to be honest, but I suppose some might say that belief would be like believing that a car will carry you across the country, whereas faith would actually be to get in the car and drive it across the country. I think that's a reasonable metaphor.”
“Right, that makes some sense I think.”
Don hesitates as we pull up to the farm house “I would rephrase the analogy” he says, “Belief is more like seeing a boat and thinking that it will float and faith is taking it onto the open sea to see if it sinks.”
Don. Always the romantic.
Scene 3: the marriage of Heaven and Hell
I didn't see it coming. I had dragged my lazy summer legs to church in the heat of the summer, secretly hoping for a short, palatable and practicable message. I did not expect the topic to be on “heaven and hell” and for the speaker to spend 95% of his time emphasizing the hell side.
He opened by saying that if we were people who believe the bible should be taken literally as it is written then we should stick around for the remainder of the message. The assumption seemed to be that we did.
I considered leaving right then, but like the time I'd paid for a terrible box office remake of a terrible box office original under the influence of several pretty girls, I stuck around to see what happened.
There were a few classic fallacies to follow. There was the “if-the-preacher-says-it-its-above-question” fallacy (“There are hundreds of references to hell in the Bible”... wait a sec. No there's not. Not even close. What's a “reference”?). Then there was the, drawing a parallel from one section of the bible to another, in this case nehemiah on the watchtower applied to a warning about post-life punishment. “If the bible says it...” even if in several different places. Like playing beatles albums backwards or finding connspiracy plots in peoples magazine using numerology. There was the Jonathan Edward bomb: he said this therefore we believe this. Then there was a collection of quotes on hell, as if by someone else saying it it proved something. They weren't qualified or barred, just stated. Like this one: “If you don't believe in hell you're probably going there”. Wow. If anything fosters a fear-based dogma its that kind of thinking. If I, who as you now know, am not always sure about what I believe, does that mean I'm necessarily going to hell- and not just any hell. THEIR version of hell- because that's the one I don't believe in. What if I don't believe the right things about other parts of doctrine or characteristics of the unfathomable deity we humbly call “God”? Am I in danger of fire? Is this a gospel based on fear? Hold onto your beliefs and bury them deep within the bunker with your shotgun shells and canned goods, 'cause when the day of reckoning comes, we need to protect them as our lives depended on them. Don't question them, because we all know where that leads.
Scene 4: Love and Fear
I don't know how many people brought up that particular sermon at the pub or dinner table after church that night, except I know that I found conference with a couple of educated and experienced thoughtfulls in a back corner who took issue with the sermon as i had, and made me feel better about doing so. Two Sundays on, however, I found myself at a table with a few other church-goers with a prompt to discuss practical ways to love other people. It wasn't long 'till the topic from two weeks ago was brought up. One member at the table had apparently swallowed the watchtower metaphor down to the dregs and was sincerely concerned about the eternal destination of those in his life and wondered how to show love and draw them to the light as an act of well-meaning love.
“How do you translate to someone to whom you are asking to change their whole worldview” he asked. “Why do we get so hesitant, so scared? We are doing them a favor. They need to know.”
None of this was making sense to me and i had to contribute my perspective. It was beginning to scare me how the conversation was ringing with the remaining tones of an earlier fearful bell of my religious history which i thought had been cut down. I began by advocating that a practical way to love others was to approach humbly. We aren't any better than anyone else, i said. Not really. Our decisions are really very attached to our experiences and the more we realize this the more we can speak honestly about who we are, what we believe and why, while adjusting OUR worldviews to understand why others see differently than us. This is where I need to start to really love someone, I said to treat them as equal as God says we are.
But a comment from across the table wanted to make a distinction. Perhaps she heard echoes of pluralism in my monologue.
“But we are different: we have made a choice. Its grace, like you say, but we are different.”
So hard, I thought, to love as we aught while holding fundamentals which seem to embody a politics of othering. Yes, we accept that the difference is grace, but its no more extended to us than to those who aren't inclined to reach for it through the dark. I reminded that we should be careful, if not fearful in expressing our beliefs, because some have very good reasons to have negative associations with religion or faith.
What concerned me was the fear that the message on hell had seem to left on some hearts. I've been there, and I don't think its right. I don't.
I heard a podcast once, about a guy who coined the self-identitifier “possibilitarian”. As funny as it was pertinent, The idea was that in a world of conflicting certainties, he wasn't sure about a lot of religious assurances, but believed that they were possible. Not a new philosophy, but a fun rephrasing for an era worn down by more than a century of years Christian fundamentalism and culture wars. Inter-disciplinary awareness tells me that science has been backing down from absolutes and philosophy has not solved any of the great questions, and I find this invigorating. The conception might be that this perceptions ask one to question their faith. But I don't think that's quite right. Do we trust a system of doctrines, or God? Some will say I've sold out to say that we need to step back to see a bigger picture, but I'm trying to be honest about where this journey is taking me. I don't think I'm out to undermine a belief system, but perhaps faith, for me, is trusting God while realizing that searching for truth will not always jive with what I've believed before. Trust God while discovering his world. Step into the void like Indiana Jones? Philosopher Robert likes to say that if atheism were true then God would want us to be Athiests. Can I trust God to get me through a journey if that journey is a genuine pursuit of Truth and Light? It has been said that all truth is God's truth. What have we to fear?
Ignorance is bliss?
nah...
Ignorance is closing your eyes in the twilight.
We wait for all the cards to be on the table, but we look out the window trying to glimpse the wind.
Limitation is life.
but I trust its enough.
Scene 5: a Red Light
I rolled down my window at the red light and leaned across the passenger seat to say hi to a guy I knew from the church I used to help out at in the town where I used to live. I wouldn't say we got along really well, but he was well-meaning. If anything, I was probably a jerk and he was the guy who ignored the fact. Got to give him that.
“You heading to church?” he asked, we were both driving into the city, away from our small town church. I hesitated. It was sunday. I was on my way to have breakfast with friends. I hadn't been to church on a Sunday morning in a long time.
“Uh, no. Breakfast... You?”
“Yeah, a new church” he gave me the name. “You know it?” I'd lived in the neigbourhood a long time. I knew a lot of the local institutions. I knew this one by reputation. I wanted to ask why he wasn't going to the church back in the town, but i guessed at the answer.
One trades up.
The name of the church denomination made my stomach turn a bit. I've come to know it through a collection of vocal Church people from around town who I'd come to, frankly, avoid. Even showed up to a few of their church services when I followed a pretty girl in. What I couldn't handle was how everyone seemed to be talking at me, from a point of authority. They told me that scriptural authority was ignored by most churches. They told me about the denomination's Bible college in California as some kind of utopia. One guy came back espousing scriptural authority and the importance of exegesis. Fuck. I've heard enough of that greek derivitave cultural contextualizing business. Same as any historical work except that these kinds of Christians are the only ones who seem to think they can achieve an authority on truth whereas the rest realize that there's inherent problems which prohibit any ultimate claim. Two of the loudest of this following had built a reputation in my mind for backing less-confrontational people into corners and telling them how the Catholic church was a heretic pagan institution. Not a fan of that approach, nor the attitude. Also not a fan of how leadership in Christian institutions, whether churches, youth groups or campus ministries, look at the headstrong people like these guys and mistake it as a leadership asset which should be employed in their institution. Scares me, to be honest. Young people don't need a narrow set of ideals and doctrines any more than the rest of us, but it might do them more damage.
The problem, as I see it, is that a group like the one my friend was enroute to congregating with might have been as well-meaning as he was. But when you start saying that everyone else is wrong and only you have it right, it seems like you're on your way to becoming a cult yourself. For better of for worse, people seem to latch onto groups with a strict set of beliefs, and I guess that included me, but a few years ago owning the authority stopped sounding cool and smart and cutting-edge, and started rubbing me the wrong way. When you set up your bible, your interpretative process, your college professors or the word of your pastor from the pedestal as some kind of idol, some kind of authority, I get scared and defensive. When someone starts waving the Bible like a weapon that they alone know how to use, then I'm afraid they might indeed kill and maim, well meaning or not. Knowing the Bible is not knowing God. Categorically its not. Does knowing more make me elite anyways? Does the lubricant from spitting contests sharpen iron, even if a sword is what you wanted? Is scriptural interpretation based on seeking the truth or propping up one's own ability? Authority? Philosopher Robert recently told me that the more he experiences in life the more he has learned to question those in power: those who have something to lose by losing their side of a debate.
The light turned green and I pulled away.
Its tough to get along.
Scene 6: Fear; all that we saw was owing to
I don't know if it was the dreary rain that oppressed my glorious hike on the West coast or my aloneness, the Vampire Weekend song I had just heard on my drive up to the trailhead
(“If I’m born again I know that the world will disagree
Want a little grace but who’s gonna say a little grace for me?
We know the fire awaits unbelievers
All of the sinners the same
Girl, you and I will die unbelievers
Bound to the tracks of the train
I’m not excited, but should I be?
Is this the fate that half of the world has planned for me?”)
but somehow, for some reason, I was transported back to a dark place in my spiritual journey- a place ruled by fear. I fell, like a spirit on my soul or drug on my mind on oppression which drew on the fatal threat of “what if”. If you let the “what if” rule you- succumb to the possiblity that the fundamentalist is right, that those not accepting of the truth and redemption according to their system is doomed- then there was no way out. There was no chancing that it COULD be wrong. The stakes were too high. Must treat it like truth. Not even room to question- to reintrepret it, to re-explain. No room for any of that.
I thought about something I'd read about, I think it was about Brother Laurence who evidently struggled much of his later life in knowing twheter his sould was secured for salvation. Brother Lawrence, the guy who wrtoe the book on just enjoying God's prescence and fnding joy and satisfaction in doing every menial task to his love, rather than regimenting certain blocks of time to disciplined and forced communion. I wondered if he doubted his salvation when he looked around and reaslized that he was doing things differently than everyone else. He wasn't obeying the formula. He doubted. He fell to the “what if” and he stumbled into fear. In fear religion is an opiate.
Its better to die on your feet than live down on your knees.” I'd heard the mantra applied to life in religion and heard it as a sad rebellion against a God who doesn't force us on our knees, but helps us find our bearing. In this moment of regression, this hike of fear, however, I suddenly encountered what I think they really meant.
My sould screamed it to the fear, and my will said “NO!” with but a hint of a quiver, “NO!” I can't go back there! I'd sooner walk away and loose it all.
This is no way to live.
Hell, this is no way to hope.
And so I came back to that odd bit of gospel- like the word “gospel” itslef; the idea that Jesus' message was, in fact, “good news”- I came back to that line, desperate to believe it, “the Thief comes to kill and destroy, but I have come so that you might have life and have it to the full.”
No. This couldn't be gospel: This “what if”- this fear-based unsurety was the thief. It killed. It was destroying.
I looked up and saw cedars and salal bushes and picked some huckleberries and saw the birds and the surf and the people, all the beautiful people. And i breathed this goodness deep into my mortal lungs.
Scene 7: Come all ye weary
Pasta Rob was speaking at church. He offered up some hope. He reminded me of another little bit of gospel which pointed to liberation rather than slavery.
“Come to me you who are heavenly burdened and I will give you rest.” This was evidently saying that the gospel was being made accessible. 'till then the teachers of the law and members of the strict and full-time religious orders had something of a monopoly on righteousness and religion. The lower class people could only do their best to keep up with the books of law and regulations that were prescribed for a Godly life. Jesus said “enough!” A great weight will be lifted. Come to me you who are weary of being yelled at by preachers and told you aren't good enough. I will give you rest. Come to me you who feel weighed down by fear that failing to keep the rules will prove you don't love God enough or belong with his saints- those ruled by the fear of the fundamentalists and the dogma... and I will give you rest. Come to me you who are almost as fed up with religious people as you are with their religion, who are tired of being told to fit a mold- the pharisaic mold, the Sadducaic mold, the stoic mold, the protest line or the show-up-on-time mold, the mold that says you can play piano at church Sunday morning but not at the pub on Saturday night, the mold where a youth master is a near ideal with anything he effuses while a single, thirty-something artist academic who works at a charity which serves sex workers without bringing religion in, is most certainly not. He hasn't shaved in a while. I think he lives with a dealer. He asks inappropriate questions. He votes for the other party. He smokes when he's anxious. He makes us nervous. Why does he bother? Because Jesus said.
Come to me.
Scene 8: the impossibility of unconditionality... and the hope that its not.
We had just run into some Mormons- which was fun. I used to walk past them for the same reason i walk past pushy perfume kiosks at the mall: I'm not in the market. I knew that some people insistently challenge them and talk with them and debate them, but I felt this was equivalent to the same kind of spitting contest that evangelical denominations already have with each other. (Who is smarterest now?!) It accomplishes little. But then i realized that these young missionary guys (why are there never girls?) are all on a journey, literally, traveling on their own pilgrimage. Its really fun to get them off track by asking them about the different small towns they've stayed in. But all that is beside the point.
I was in Salmon Arm for a wedding and was strolling around town with a friend I hadn't seen in a few years: Crazy Chelsea. I love Crazy Chelsea. We used to go to the same college, but then she moved to the big city to pursue her desire to help people and change the world. I think it was there that she both made her mark, but moreover got marked up. But talking to her now was as good or better conversation as ever, and the Mormons set off a dialogue between the two of us as we parted ways with them, that allowed each of us to catch the other up on our lives in the years we hadn't seen one another. We had both re-evaluated our Christian educations. She asked how I managed to enter the academic world with my Christian perspective. By loosing it, I answered. Probably the best thing that could've happened, in hindsight. It was by having it all fall apart that I was able to accept new information openly and honestly and honestly put my faith experience against it. It was liberating, if depressing at times, and that should be telling. When my faith had really been deconstructed I had the good luck to meet people who helped me build it up with out a lot of the ill-foundations it had been built on before. Taking a religion course, for instance, without bias or concern of being proven wrong, was releasing. It helped me relate to people better.
Chels started talking about conversations she's had with her dad, stuff about angels sitting on pinheads or whatever, creationism and salvation and truth and the way one of these hangs on the other. She admitted that she didn't probably believe some of the stuff that her dad insisted on. She believed in the evidence of science, for instance, which he evidently considered an affront to religious truth. The trouble was that these conversations she had with her father wouldn't sit well with her later. The question became, she explained, “well dad, do you still love me. Do you still love me despite what I believe. I mean, I'm still your daughter aren't I?”
I know a guy who ran away from the cultish brethren church of his parents, as a teenager. Upset and looking to escape he ran straight to the continental hell hole of debauchery and decadence: Disneyland. When he ran out of money and food and returned home, however, his parents shunned him. Made him sleep in the basement.
My friend Laurels' grandparents believed that preacher from the states that said that the apocalypse was going to happen last year. I wanted to know how they treated their children and grandchildren in the lead-up. She said it was a chilly relationship. More interesting was after. Her grandfather came back to her mother and apologized. Her mother said no worries; we all believe some crazy stuff.
Chelsea's point was so valid. Does our love/care for others depend on their beliefs? Does God's? And when I was done chewing on that, I flipped it: Can I love the fanatical fundamentalist despite the pain they cause to others? That's a tougher one.
“And then” said Chels, “there's this religious idea I've been raised with that we aren't to be happy, pursue it, or want it. I think happiness is a gift, and something that I feel church has robbed me of.”
Freedom to question. Freedom To be loved regardless of beliefs or conduct. Freedom to pursue happiness. If I can believe that these are valid liberties, will I love people better, worse, or indifferent?
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