Faithless

My friends, I feel that I have left a part of myself in my past, to be remembered fondly but to be a part of me no more. It is here that I shall attempt to articulate what that means, perhaps in what may be a surprising manner to some. As always, I write to respectfully cause cognitive dissonance in myself and others, so please take any harsh language in such a context, and please disagree with me or come to me personally if you are concerned.

To those close to me that did not see this coming: I'm sorry. I do not mean to cause you any sort of surprise or distress, and I want to talk about this if you are those things. Please accept that some things go better in writing than they do in spoken words for me, and that this could no longer stay inside, bottled up, without making me burst from the pressure. I must be who I am. I know you understand.

It is not often that I use media to make a point on this blog. I, in fact, try to avoid it whenever possible. It is precisely because of this trend that I beg your indulgence today. I will attempt to describe what I need to, but the visuals and music in this video make it much simpler.

If that doesn't load very well for you or you didn't feel like watching it, here is how I must describe things.

I was alone in the desert, left behind, and I was offered a reprieve from my loneliness. All I had to do was truly embrace the life of faith. The price for that was my hope, dreams, and intellect. I fought hard against this price for a very long time.

"Hope is truly found in this life," said I, "just look at the cool glass of water that's been poured for me! I shall never go thirsty for the hope of a bright future." And yet, what kind of a future was I offered? There was the promise that all things would be reconciled, that the ideal of a world without war would exist, but those of faith differ wildly on such things, and church history is replete with war, ostracization, and excommunication. How could these things possibly add up to the kind of Love that Bell wrote about in "Love Wins" or Manning wrote about in "The Ragamuffin Gospel"? That furious love, that unstoppable grace that even the traditional conception of hell could not stand against. And yet, I was told, hell does exist, enemies do exist, and the hope I was offered came with a price...us vs them. Or perhaps more eloquently...us trying to save them. Why then, have I never felt a need to save anyone? Why have I never met a "them"? All of the hope I found was found in people, and eventually in myself. The hope I was offered was nihilism wrapped up in theism.

I dreamed of being something special. In fact, I was told I would be so from a very young age. I was told I would change the world, that I would be one of the people that made faith sensical and rational and compassionate. Why does it need to be made these things if God's work was complete? The answer, of course, was that we are in process. "Dreams," I said, "are sourced from God, for from Him all good things come." So I kept looking up, kept looking outward, kept exploring. What I've found is a universe where life is not static, but dynamic. Love is not a binary, but a journey. Our race is not the center of the universe, but a part of it that we create the meaning of. More and more evidence mounts every day that life on this planet is expressed in many forms rather than species after their own kind, and that active respect is necessary for all of it if we as a race are to even survive. I was never taught this, and so it seems odd to even say. My dreams of being some kind of religious revolutionary began to seem extremely small compared to what the universe is and what humanity is in it. From this, I realized that I am special, and I am so because I choose to be who I am, every day.

My intellect, or perhaps my thoughts, have been what's guided me through so much in life. Every situation thoughtfully analyzed, every concept making sense, and every experience noted. "True philosophy," I said, "comes about naturally from the correct presuppositions and correct ways of thinking. If God is the source of this, then it is ordered in an understandable way, and it is how to understand the mind of God." So I continued to read, I continued to theorize and understand, and I have only begun to see the way logic runs in circles, presuppositions seem to come out of thin air and are deconstructed just as easily, and philosophies are like waves in the ocean. Why does one wave matter when you have the entirety of the ocean to see? Enjoy that wave, ride it or go through it, and move forward. You may be going through it while another person is riding it, but your positions will be switched around before you know it, when the next wave comes. It can't be taken so seriously that you can't play at points or enjoy yourself.

So it all began to feel wrong. If faith truly was a reprieve from loneliness, then why was I living like a reject in darkness, and why were my pursuits so adamantly rejected by most of those I spoke with? Even the "Christian philosophers" I spoke to seemed to disagree with and reject me when it was needed. The agenda began to become apparent to me, and I began to change as a result.

"Just go back to sleep," they said, as the rag was placed over my mouth. The abuse was real, as I was silenced in every way possible, and I felt that it was warranted. Truly, my mind was bent and my heart was twisted in such a real sense that I am still recovering from it. "I deserve this," said I, "for I have failed. I am human, and I just don't understand something." However, the haunting truth was that I really believed that they were the ones that were wrong, and that their religion was not representative of my own faith, despite the realization I would only come to later that what they represented was so connected to what I did that a true revolution was impossible. The presuppositions were too rigid. This is why those in religions that are out to cause real change are always referred to as "radical," meaning back to the roots, or "reforming," similarly meaning returning to the true nature of that religion.

Some say that a sufficiently disciplined mind can compartmentalize contradictory pieces of information. I believed, truly, that I was correct because I was called to be special by God, and that I was also worthless, useless, and alone. For some reason, these things went together into a martyrdom I can only describe as capture-bonding. This is more well-known as Stockholm Syndrome.

What happens when a person endures this for long enough? They break. They either become a complete shell of who they were, accepting the continual abuse of their soul placidly, or they develop a problem with the authority so casually invading their very person, and they decide they've had enough. My study of church history took this to a whole new level, as I realized that Christianity, the faith I was raised to believe in, came about from some incredibly violent historical circumstances, and that this abuse of people had been taking place since the very beginning. My study of the hero archetype of Jesus was the last piece of this puzzle, and it made the claim that the story of Christ was more important than the historical reality of his existence (or non-existence) make a lot of sense. If I may borrow from one of my favorite shows, "all of this has happened before, and it will all happen again." If the story of Christ was not unique, and the story of the church is a power struggle like many others, with the occasional idealistic and great figure emerging to make it about good things, then what is unique to the faith I was raised in, morally, historically, theologically, philosophically, politically, or in any other way?

It all comes down to a question: who do you trust?

Once again, we are back to people. The people I trust are of all different faiths, all different backgrounds, and they are all so uniquely human.

So the last great lie I was sold that I had to reject, "the smile when you tore me apart," was that I am, and am meant to be, alone. I am not meant to be alone. I do not know if God exists or if he does not, but every religious experience I have had so far I can soundly attribute to people. Whether that is authority, friendship, love, public experiences of "worship," or family, I can attribute the things that move my soul to people, and to people alone.

My friends, I must confess that I am tired of imposing loneliness on myself, and I refuse to do it anymore. I love people, and they frustrate me so much sometimes because I believe that we can be better. No one thing can cause this, but I wish to become better by listening, by being open with people, by learning, by arguing, by discussing and philosophizing and enjoying music and art and literature and absurdity and laughter and beauty. I wish to grieve with others, to be a conduit for comfort to the hurt and the downtrodden, and to be a voice of realism to those that feel they must continue to hurt themselves to be acceptable. It is so unnecessary.

I can no longer say I have faith in the supernatural God that I was raised to believe in. What does this make me? I have no idea at the moment, other than to say that I am still the same person I have always been. I am still a critical thinker, I am still absurd and awkward and hilarious, and I am still something of an idealist. I still respect the possibility of a god, but I also deeply respect agnosticism, pantheism, atheism, polytheism, monotheism, and those who don't want to bother with any definition or framework to represent their thoughts. This is because they represent something to the people who believe in them, and that fascinates me.

So faithless I may be, but that does not mean I am different or have lost my ideals. If a god does exist that I will meet one day, it is the person I am that he will see, and judge, if that is even what will happen. However, I choose to live like I have one life, and I wish to make it count in real ways.

On Sin, or True Dissonance

I don't even know what to write right now. This may make no sense, but I have some things to process.

How does a person deal with all intellectual structures around them falling out from under them? How do you deal with your reservoir of faith running totally dry? What do you do when all of the answers of spiritualists, mystics, religious figures, and those you've grown up listening to sound like nothing more than abuse? What do you do when you realize you've been psychologically abused for a good portion of your life?

You are worthless. You are a sinful, horrible monster. You are broken. You've missed the mark. Your best intentions are filthy rags. You don't know what you're doing. You're horrible. You suck. You must constantly repent, constantly be sorry, and constantly deny yourself any happiness. You need our answers. We know God, and the only way we can be sure you do is if you gain the same understanding that we deem spiritual. You better not be wrong, though your nature is to be wrong constantly. You must doubt yourself constantly, never have confidence, never be correct, always be self-deprecating. You are a fool, but you mustn't call your neighbor a fool. Your neighbor is anyone else. They must be allowed to run you over constantly, because you are worse than dirt. You deserve to be persecuted. You deserve death. You deserve eternal torment forever. You are worthless. Your sex drive makes you sinful. Your questions make you arrogant. Your humanity makes you useless. Your ideas make you heretical. Your creativity makes you threatening. Your compassion is empty, your grace hollow, your beauty pointless, your mind broken, your heart evil, your soul monstrous. God loves you anyway, because we say so. You should be grateful.

It hurts. Beyond any thoughts, any reason, any movement or investigation or research or experience, I must admit to the fact that I have been abused by those who claim to be in authority. I have never been sexually abused, and I've never been hit in my life. My family is wonderful, and I've had good friends for most periods of my life. But I have learned the mantra of self-hatred, and it is attached to growing up as a Christian. I learned in Christian school that when one is angry at the church, the first question one must ask is "who is it?"

There is no one person. It doesn't matter which theology, which church, which sect, which movement I deal with, this mantra is always a part of it. Even those centered on grace cling to the doctrine of sin. Whether it is phrased that we accept salvation so God does not allow or cause our eternal torture, or that we live in salvation to participate in who God is, and any other way to live is hell, Christians still speak of hell constantly, whenever salvation is spoken of. Because we are so free that we can choose whatever we want, even though God's way is the only real way to live.

The question is...who has articulated God's way correctly? Has the Roman Catholic Church? Has the Protestant Reformation? Has Islam? Has Judaism? Has the Orthodox Church? Has the Pentecostal Church? Has the liberal sections of Christianity? The UMC? The Baptists? The Anglicans? Are there actually multiple gods? Who is God? El? Allah? Jesus? Yahweh? Which way is the correct way?

"We shape our god, and our god shapes us." This is from the only man that has ever portrayed religion to me as anything but abusive. The movement itself, which has emerged from the Postmodern world's religious sentiments, is a complex form of psychology, rooted in the historic orthodox Christian faith. An acknowledgment and apology for the history of religion, and a willingness to be progressive, to move forward, to narrow one's focus to only who Jesus is, reinterpreting the ancient scriptures through that person. Incarnational, compassionate, and focused on a God that simply wants to reunite with humanity. In this framework, sin is us, however it actually happened, losing a relationship with our creator. His desire to reunite with us is what drives his actions. We were made to create as well, and we do it through relationships, art, science, philosophy, religion, history, literature, and culture.

The question is...how much of the historic, orthodox Christian faith is kept in this movement? It is ecumenical in focus, often including other religions. The notion is that God has been after humanity for a while, but we must choose Him as well. Religions are the byproduct of us sensing the spiritual world.

Ancient Christianity is not progressive in nature, and is concerned with continuing the traditions of the religion itself. Church history has been fraught with power struggles, war, death, movements and reformations, and all of the things that we've come to expect of humans through study of history and our nature. The thing is...if empirical science proves something wrong, then religion has no choice but to change it.

So, we are left with two questions. Firstly, given how little we know about the universe and existence, how can we be sure that our scientific conclusions are, in fact, correct? Secondly, how can a God, whose nature is unprovable, exist at all?

1. Science, by its' nature, is a method of progress. The more we study, the more we understand through research and observation, the better science becomes at portraying the universe. That said, the more we study science the more questions we have, and that is the beauty of it. Will we ever understand all of existence? I simply do not know. We constantly revise our picture of reality, and it could be uprooted at its' core by some discoveries. How can we be sure we are correct about anything? This is why philosophy is necessary. We are now progressing into Epistemology and questioning empirical sources.

2. God's every move avoids giving irrefutable proof of his existence. We are given the gift of faith, which is to say, the hope for things unseen. At some point, all of humanity has some sort of faith. Philosophically, these are more accurately termed to be presuppositions. For example, I have faith that what I am looking at and interacting with is, in fact, reality.

However, religious faith, particularly theistic faith, is entirely different. You see, the nature of Jesus is relational, by a matter of course. He is a proof of God's existence, God in flesh, but only if you believe the miracles reported by ancient sources, uncorrelated by any other historical sources outside of the Christian religion. What then? Is this merely an anti-faith bias I am spouting, or is it possible that historians had a religious agenda around the founding of Christianity? Does not every religion believe that it only exists because it is true? Is this not believed by any devout believer of any religion?

So there is a God, who is all powerful and all knowing and compassionate and loves humanity, but there is a marked lack of evidence of such things in our chaotic world. The answer, of course, comes from the fall. We are totally free, we are the ones destroying, and we are the ones that can create and come back to God. In this sense, God is a moral standard. All good things happen because of God, and all evil happens because of humanity, or if you wish, the devil.

We have once again circled around to sin, and its' meaning as us being evil, us being separated from God, and us being uncertain about everything, necessitating faith. The empirical gap presented by science and philosophy and human understanding of the universe is used as an epistemic wedge that drives us toward faith. In this sense, the conflict between science and religion is very true indeed.

So the real question is simple. Is religion worth trusting? At the end of the day, it always seems to come down to that. Religious claims can only be made in ignorance or by trusting in a historic source. Before a movement is a religion, it is simply a spiritual proposition. The problem is, things like hell and judgment cause humans to panic, and do what they can to avoid horrible things. The instinct of self preservation is at work.

I have severe problems trusting authority, and the simple reason is because I am entirely sick of being told, implicitly and explicitly, how horrible of a person I am. The religious would say this is self-centered and arrogant of me, but they must also acknowledge their own self-centered nature by attempting to avoid hell and judgment, and their own arrogance at claiming to know all of the answers.

Religion always boils down to what humanity is saying about the spiritual world. I have no doubt that the spiritual world exists, because of my own experiences with it. There is definitely something more to our existence than being animals that have evolved on a planet in one universe of millions that barely understand reality. However, I must also acknowledge that part of the reason I believe in spirituality and in the idea of God is because there are people I trust and admire that also do. I must also acknowledge that I am not the most objective person right now, and that I have trust issues, systemic of things I probably do not even understand about myself yet.

What I do know is that I love understanding psychology, religion, philosophy, and this thing called spirituality. I believe this is an art, and I will probably spend my life studying and creating in it. For me to do this, I must leave behind this notion that I am inadequate. It has been toxic to me for my entire life, and I am sick of it. Even if the notion of sin is true, I learned when I was very young that sin means I must berate myself, and it has always held me back.

I also know that I cannot sacrifice my intellectual honesty just because I am uncomfortable questioning something that has been part of my identity for a long time. No matter the consequences, I must move forward. I simply have no more faith left to give to this destructive culture I have grown up in. What does this make me? I have absolutely no idea, but it's pretty interesting.

Mystification

Sometimes, we have to stop and ask ourselves questions. When it comes to my situation, I've had to stop because life is intensely and in my face unfair, frustrating, and dangerous. I've realized I've been angry a lot because I thought I was owed something by life. I thought my prayers, my sincerity, my attempts to do the right thing, and my hard work would bring some kind of reward. Or, at the very least, I would stop struggling so much. The truth is, the more I've struggled, the more I've tried to make sense out of everything, the less I know and the less I feel I can do. In a real sense, I totally understand why people give up. I want to, almost every day.

What's damning about this is my ideals are probably the cause of most of these problems.

I grew up expecting to change the world, to be some kind of visionary and create something new that will change everything. A pretty egotistical way of living, I'd say. "Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."

I've come to understand that progress only happens when humanity stops being idiotic and thinks for a second, or when a drastic example is put in front of them and forces them out of their apathy. On one hand, this is kind of how people function in our society. On the other hand, it is infuriatingly unfair when we look at people like Nikola Tesla. Someone who was legitimately a genius, but was screwed over by people constantly. This is a man who died alone after making huge contributions to the world, while businessmen and greedy men profited by stealing from him. He also did not care. If you don't know who Tesla is, that's exactly my point. Look him up.

I'm certainly no Tesla, and a lot of people are not. However, it's important to remember that we are owed nothing and indeed, we will be given nothing if we merely work our way forward in a straightforward way. That is a recipe for being stomped on, and I've had more than enough of that. I could descend into a bitchfest about a multitude of things at this point, but that would be pointless.

A better point is also a simple one. I have decided I know nothing. I have more of an education than over 90% of the world, and that's enough to know I have more questions than answers. I still don't know much about the nature of our existence, and I look to scientists and philosophers to understand that better. I've begun to look to practical examples to learn skills to survive in every day life, and I look to spirituality for self-improvement. In all of these areas, I have more questions than answers. Indeed, in the area of my own spirituality, I seem to have nothing but questions anymore.

If we evolved over billions of years from abiogenesis, if our universe is gigantic and we are microscopic and our universe is only one of many, then what significance does one person writing on one blog even have? Indeed, is this a waste of time, or is there something more to my existence than just another sentient life form on a remote planet complaining because he has to deal with other insignificant lifeforms in a mob that run him over every single day (and more ironically, is often part of that mob just to get even)? If there is a god that cares about us that much, where is he when there are millions of people less fortunate than I who die of hunger and thirst? Does he not care? Does he not care about me? Does he not care about the insane amount of people less fortunate than I? If I'm supposed to put myself aside (sick of hearing that shit whenever I have a problem by the way) and go help other people, then is that not just man helping his fellow man? Why is the significance of community about something other than people helping each other?

The big question, of course, is why are we "murdering each other over tribal god images," as Q so aptly put it? Given our advancing understanding of the universe, we are left with more and more disturbing implications and more questions, and the religion I've grown up interacting with has exactly one current public figure that even comes close to interacting with legitimate questions, and with helping those who are actually unfortunate, as opposed to a disillusioned college graduate with some minor emotional problems. That public figure is routinely reviled and harassed by the majority of his own religion. Let that sink in for a moment.

A religion, based on Jesus, who came and turned a persecuted religion that was looking for the messiah on its' head. He said that money and power are pointless, and that there are more important things to life. He was then killed by the predominant religious and political powers of the day. Two millenia later, we're left with a violent church history full of power struggle and bloodshed, and an institution that acts like any other does with money. When does the majority simply overpower the minority? When does the religion itself become illegitimate because the abuse is found to be the natural outcome of the theology itself? Can we really afford to continue to talk about how we live in a fallen world with sinful people, or should we simply accept who we are and get over ourselves and our power structures that will cause our own destruction?

These questions aren't about me, they're simply a product of a mind that can't seem to stop asking questions like these. I can't afford to continue doing business as usual and being the same person I always have been. Not anymore.

If there is one thing I've learned since I've graduated college, it's that those in power are going to abuse those not in power 99% of the time. Out of sight, out of mind. I'm the same way. I want to have so much money that I don't need to put effort into anything anymore. I want to have so much control that I don't have to deal with the uncertainty of life anymore. These are the actions of someone who is afraid, and I am done with it. Life is to be lived now, and all one can do is their best. The ideals I've grown up with no longer function for me, so it's time to start over again, as one knowing nothing.

The Morality of Atheism and Theism: Science, Religion, and Progress

Some say the universe came into existence through a rapid expansion, a "Big Bang." Some say that it began with a single Word from God, in creativity and joy. Some say it began with a conflict between multiple gods, through war and strife. Some say the universe has always existed and perpetually will exist.

The origin and nature of humanity has been attributed to many thing as well. The prevailing scientific theory is one of Abiogenesis and Evolution, life arising from inorganic matter and continuously evolving. The religious would say that humanity was created spontaneously by God and is a spiritual as well as physical being. Others would say that we are spirits and all of the physical world is incidental, that we are spirits inhabiting physical bodies, awaiting freedom at death. To be absent from the body is to be present with God. Some make no claims about the origin of man, stating that they simply do not know.

In general, people are theistic or they are atheistic. There are gods or a single God, or there are no gods. A god is usually defined as a being that is above humanity, or as the greatest possible being. Supernatural, with power beyond what humans have, and usually immortal or possessing an ascension beyond death and usually the laws of the physical world. Many cultures have had conceptions of gods, and the Abrahamic religions are the major monotheistic ones (Islam, Judaism, Christianity). Christianity is peculiar in that it, for the most part, includes the doctrine of the Trinity, that God exists in three person, who are united in one essence. This is commonly subject to the accusation of being polytheistic by the other Abrahamic religions.

The only reason I don't speak about polytheistic religions is because I don't know them as well. I would like to remedy that through study of various theology, culture, and mythology, as I think they're very interesting. However, for now I speak of monotheistic religion.

Religion has evolved over the years, and some link it with the continued voice of ignorance and lack of progress. Unfortunately, this is often correct. The most frequent disparity is between the voice of science and the voice of religion. Indeed, you can probably see this in what I've written about so far. Scientific theories stand apart from religious theories regarding creation, the origin and nature of man, and the nature of the universe as prevalently atheistic. This is because the existence of gods have not been evidentially proven. The reason for this is because science is by nature materialistic and empirical. That is, it is about what can be observed and proven through testing and the scientific method.

I think it is fascinating that a type of morality has grown around the scientific method in our culture. Combined with the abuses that are easily observable from the major religions, science has become more than just a method; it's become an epistemological stance. Citing my own religious orientation as a reference, one need only read my past month of posts to note that Christianity, as I and many others have experienced it, is abusive, manipulative, destructive, and ignorant. Much of this can be traced back to theological beliefs, as practice naturally flows out of belief. You may believe that sexism and racism is contrary to your beliefs, but if you hold them dear and find yourself being sexist and racist more often than not, then it's possibly you are incorrect. The problem, of course, comes from the fact that your beliefs are inherently unique and informed by your experiences. This is the problem of speaking about religion: no two religious individuals are precisely the same in belief.

Regardless, the moral stance of the religious often flows from commands of their deity or from implications within religious writings. The morality that seems to be developing from the movement around the scientific method is an allegiance to the truth. Which of these is a higher morality? If a deity does exist, then are they not the same thing? It is comforting to think that a being with higher morality can direct our paths, because we often don't have a clue what's going on in our lives. Or perhaps that's just me.

In any case, the natural conclusion is that our actions matter. The epistemic stance of the culture of science is that we must always progress, the method leads us forward into truth and enlightenment, and that there is no evidence thus far of anything higher evolved than man. Humanism is what we are now speaking about, because you must believe yourself to be capable of finding the truth and with a moral responsibility to move in that direction. Evidence based epistemology is admirable for its' allegiance to the truth, but it makes several assumptions. Namely, humanity is nearly god-like in humanism. No, I'm not saying humanists are egotistical maniacs. I'm saying that humanity is able to see the simple truth and that reductionism is a natural extension of that, that nothing emerges from the evidence that is beyond our comprehension, because there is nothing else. The problem with this is that if there is more than what we can prove, then the system is merely progressive and can not lend itself to claims about things beyond its' method.

In other words, the theory of evolution is a most excellent theory regarding the origin of man. However, to then move into extreme atheism from this point does not follow, as one has not scientifically tested the universe in its' entirety (whether we're speaking of the vastness or the amount of things we have yet to understand), and a negative is not a provable premise without a comprehensive knowledge. In other words, God has not been proven to exist, but that does not mean He does not exist.

That also does not mean He does exist. It is simply not provable at this time. This is why I respect atheism as a stance. It lends itself to honesty and to asking questions, which religion often does not comply with.

The simple fact is, the term atheist simply refers to one belief. There is no God. It is not faith, it is the inverse. There is no evidence, so there is no God. Theism is the opposite (obviously). There is no evidence, therefore God transcends our evidence. Both, however, are beliefs.

This is why the divide between the atheist and the theist has lost a lot of its' meaning. There are philosophical implications of both beliefs, but they are both presuppositions. To judge a presupposition, one must ask themselves what the implications are and whether or not it is true, or compliant with reality as we know it. We must, in a sense, use epistemic, scientific, and intuitive methods for measuring our presuppositions, as none are adequate on their own.

This leads to a whole litany of questions. If there is a God, then where is He? Why is there evil if a being is powerful enough to prevent it? Why is there anything good at all if this God is evil? If there is no God, how do we explain the spiritual aspect of our lives? Are we merely evolving to a higher state of being? Is something more emerging from humanity, or has it been there all along, as the existence of religions would imply? What's the point of what I do? How can what I do not matter if it affects others and the universe?

We're all trying to understand and find meaning, but some have stopped and they think this is all there is. Their religion/stance/culture/morality is the endpoint, and they become militant while others are still asking questions, still trying to understand, still learning.

Where do I stand between science and religion? I answer yes to this question. They address two different things, evidence and intuition. The material reality and the spiritual reality. They are not so different, and they bleed over into each other. Why else would we have stories, and why else would I and those like me, as young children, go outside and look at the stars and wonder what else is out there?

I asked in my previous post why it matters what I believe and what I think. In a sense, I am merely a small being theorizing on a random blog with a few readers that hopefully benefit by cognitive dissonance. In another sense, I'm asking questions that my race is asking in its' global culture. We cannot escape from the morality and the implications of our actions and beliefs, and as a Christian, I once again come back around to saying that I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what my religion has done, for the ignorance it has promoted, for the harm it has done. What is important is to move forward from that, progress, and do better. That is the nature of repentance, and it's what I and those like me strive for. This goes beyond religion to being a person open to truth, being an explorer, and giving respect to what is around you and demanding that respect in return.

Why I am not a Western Christian: Rome, Nietzsche, and Protestantism

I've written over the past month about my history with religious institutions and movements, and where all of that has led me. I think it's fair to say that at this point I am a mix of conflicted sentiments, beliefs, logical claims, and emotions for that matter. It's difficult for me to sort through all of these things when I'm trying to talk to others about these things, and it becomes even more difficult when they have strong claims. Most of the time when an atheist tells me they can't take Christianity seriously for almost any reason, I agree. Usually there is some kind of straw man involved, as usually when people oppose something, it is because they are hurt. For me there is no escape from that. However, I believe that it's beneficial to call out one straw man in particular, even while agreeing with the reactions I often hear in the same breath.

What this means is that when someone tells me that Christianity has been responsible for a lot of killing, hurting, and obscuring of the truth, and that there are a lot of ignorant people spouting Christianity, my response tends to be two-fold. First of all, and this is usually the only response I have time to give, I agree and can only say I'm sorry. My particular convictions lead me toward the term Christian, and so I am truly sorry for all of the people doing stupid things and forcing inane beliefs on others that use the same term. It aggravates me that I'm even associated with some of them, and it's hard to see the ones that are reasonable and good people when you've been hurt by the unreasonable ones taking cheap shots and being generally dishonorable and destructive.

Secondly, I believe that this portrayal of Christianity requires nuance, at the very least. I don't blame anyone for thinking that Christianity is only its' Western expression, because I live in the west and most of the Christianity that people have experienced has been western in nature. What this means is that the Christianity people react against is at once influenced by the modernist, Enlightenment era thought, and it is usually reacting to it. A good example of this is how the Catholic Church often makes claims and takes stances on contemporary issues like abortion, the political conflict surrounding homosexuality, contraceptives, and generally will makes its' voice known coming from their "faith centered" perspective. For the devout Catholics, their faith runs through every bit of their lives through various expressed opinions and actions, and their politics and social activism are greatly affected by their theology and spread through their church's power.

Another good example of Western Christianity is the "Moral Majority." I shudder to even bring this group up because of how offensive they are. To put it simply, this movement served to take Conservative Christianity into the political realm and bring about change by outlawing abortion in all cases, oppose any governmental acceptance of homosexuals, promote a "traditional" view of family life, and target non-Christians for conversion (Evangelical activism). The Moral Majority was nearly a theocratic movement, seeking to make the US Government Christian (or return it to its' Christian roots if you ask them).

It is on this second point I wish to focus. How can I call myself a Christian and be revolted and enraged by much of contemporary Christianity?

The movements mentioned are only examples of the way Christianity has evolved in the past few centuries. Indeed, this extends far beyond Evangelical Christian Conservatives and Roman Catholics. This sort of wide sweeping agenda has been happening for centuries. Rome has been this way since the schism from the East a millenium ago, and they've evolved ever since, constantly adapting to culture and being a voice on relevant issues, reasoning from their core theology and often speculating. The Pope's "Ex Cathedra" (infallible while speaking on matters of Doctrine) has assisted with their development. The Protestant Reformation in the 16th Century reacted to the abuses of Rome and demanded a reform of the church to do away with malpractice and corrupt theology. This eventually lead to another schism of the church, and many more to follow.

Protestantism came about around this time, and they distinguished themselves from Rome with doctrines like the Solas and several different fundamental summations of beliefs. In general, the way Protestantism has come to distinguish itself is by the reliance on the Bible as its' sole source of authority, justification by faith alone, and the priesthood (some would say papacy) of all believers. What this means is that a Protestant believes that the Bible is the authoritative source of truth, salvation and justification from Original Sin (I'll get to this in a minute) comes by faith in Christ alone, and the responsibility of all Christians to act in a governing manner in the church from their reading of Scripture.

Protestantism distinguished itself from Rome by moving away from the apostolic succession of the priesthood, probably because of a denial of Papal authority in all matters of doctrine. In other words, since the Bible was now seen as the ultimate source of authority as opposed to Rome's traditions and the authority of the pope, the Bible was theoretically the Pope's replacement. In addition, priests in a Protestant Church were now every member, with a preacher in a loose leadership role. Some protestant churches use deacons, and some use elders, but this is purely for loose ecclesiastical use, as opposed to Rome's authoritative priesthood and ultimately authoritative pope. The protestant is solely responsible for their own faith, and though "good works" are seen as beneficial, they are not seen as necessary in Protestantism. "You will know a tree by its' fruit" has come to mean that you will probably see some sign that a person is saved, but Protestantism sharply reacts against Rome's "works based" Salvation. The Protestant generally shuns the Sacraments as means of Grace, usually preferring to call them ordinances or specific things like the Lord's Supper/Communion or Baptism.

Protestantism kept to their Roman roots in some other ways, however. They kept the doctrine of Original Sin as taught by Augustine, which teaches that all of humanity sinned in Adam, and so we are all guilty and subject to judgment from birth. This has lead to Calvin's emphasis and eventual teaching of predestined Election of the saved, as well as to some odd teachings like the "Age of Accountability," which teaches that before someone can make the intellectual decision to be saved, they are essential saved by their own "innocence." In Rome's case, Original Sin lead to the dogma of Immaculate Conception, which taught that Mary was born free of Original Sin, which allowed for Christ's birth of Mary, a Virgin, without it. More on Original Sin in a moment.

In a way, Protestantism has also largely held onto the legalistic views of Rome by way of their Salvation narrative. In general, Salvation is seen as an intellectual acknowledgment of one's broken and unsaved state to God, and an acceptance of Christ's death as the payment for their sin. From that point, the Protestant is now legally justified in the sight of God, saved by faith alone. Some say they can fall away from this faith given an adequate rejection of Salvation, and some say they never can. Still others say that if the Christian's salvation is rejected, they were never saved in the first place, as the predestined will persevere to death and the end of time.

What I hope you are noticing in what I'm saying here is that Western Christianity has come to be what people generally think about when you say the word "Christian." When I started at college, I made a Facebook group called "Catholics are Christians too!" I made this group after noting the large amount of prejudice against Roman Catholics on my college campus. It was common for someone to state that Catholics believe in dead religion and works based salvation, usually in a tone like they're cursing or about to spit on the people. I created this group because I believed that Catholics had just as much of a claim to the term "Christian" as any Protestant. I bring this up because often people would ask me if I am Catholic. When I said no, they'd be confused, and ask if I was Protestant. Only two options were present for them, Catholic and Protestant, with Protestant usually meaning "Christian." Obviously, not all Protestants are this way. However, it is important to note that the movement of Protestantism itself started from dissatisfaction from Rome that lead to a schism and pointed reactions against Rome's theology.

Roman Catholicism originally schismed from the Eastern Orthodox Church around 1054 AD. They schismed over several matters of theology and practice, but the deciding factor of the schism, in addition to Rome's assertion of the Pope (Bishop of Rome) as the prime authority of the church, was the addition of the filioque to the Nicene Creed.

Filioque. "And the Son." This was a phrase added to the Nicene Creed to make it state that the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father and the Son, rather than simply the Father.

If you weren't raised in Eastern Orthodoxy or Roman Catholicism you may be asking yourself "who cares?" I know I did for a long time. The East saw this as an addition that brought undue imbalance to the doctrine of the Trinity, that God is a Tri-une God composed of the persons of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The balance of the Trinity was due to each person of the Trinity having specific roles as seen in history and due to all of them sharing the essence and nature of being God.

If you wonder why you never hear about the Holy Spirit unless you're talking to a pentecostal or someone involved in a charismatic movement, this would be the reason. The Protestant Church inherited the filioque from Rome (though they're generally not as rigorous in theology on this point, obviously), as well as the legalism inherent in the institution that can ultimately be traced to Original Sin.

"Original Sin" as a term, has been used throughout Christian history. It initially referred to the original catastrophic act that caused the brokenness of humanity. If we go back to Genesis, this act was disobeying God by eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. This was largely caused by Lucifer's corruption and subsequent deception of Adam and Eve into committing this act, which destroyed their innocence and introduced Death into the world. Original Sin came to mean that all of humanity sinned in this act, and we genetically inherit the guilt. I'm going over this again because this is important.

Fast forward to Christ (most Protestants do), and we have a righting of this wrong. One can be wiped free of this curse by accepting the sacrifice which Christ took on himself on the cross, and be resurrected from death in the same way Christ was literally resurrected. Legally, we are justified in God's sight by the Father allowing Christ to bear the entire punishment of Original Sin (the Calvinist at this point would say the punishment for only the chosen Elects' original sin).

Salvation has come to be a "get out of hell" card. People often refer to this as "fire insurance."

No, I am not kidding.

So, to come back to my original point. I think Christianity needs nuance. I agree with Nietzsche's reaction to Christianity, and I agree with the atheist's objections. Indeed, God is dead in our culture, and we have killed him. The Western religions of Christianity have the common threads of being legalistic, reductionistic, impractical, and omnidirectional/contradictory in reasoning in political, theological, and philosophical areas. God kills God to satisfy God's wrath so we can all go to paradise in the clouds or a city paved with gold. All you have to do is believe.

I am not a Western Christian because I think there is far, far more to life than this, and that we cannot rely on myth and storytelling to give us a literal picture of the future or of reality. Salvation has to mean more than this, and Christ's story has to be accepted fully rather than a grand total of 4 days of it. The Bible did not come from a vacuum or float down from the clouds in all its' perfection, and a book cannot possibly be the ultimate source of truth or the ultimate authority on life. I do not believe in Original Sin as taught in Western Christianity because I do not think people are born guilty, and do not think that this esoteric "imputed sin" is passed down through any genetic means. I do not accept the legalism that's been taught to me by the west because of this, and I do not accept the imbalanced version of the trinity that I've also been taught, where the Holy Spirit is either elaborate magic or does not exist, and Christ has primacy over other aspects of God. The question here, however, is why do I believe these things? Who cares what I accept and don't accept? Why does what I believe matter at all, in comparison to the true reality of the universe, if there is one?

Well, that's a story for another day my friends. That day will be next week, or perhaps Friday if I can swing it. Be well, and thanks for reading.

Divergence: Transcending Bitterness, False Dichotomy, and Mystic Christianity

I've written so far about my religious experiences and some tentative conclusions from them. However, when speaking about religion, one cannot help but speak about everything else. It's the nature of the beast, and why I found it impossible to transcend calling myself religious without abandoning all of my beliefs. Though I've been willing to do that, I still think that what I have put my faith in is true, despite the absurdity surrounding it. We'll get to that later in this post.

So, let's start from the beginning. I've grown up inundated with conservative Evangelical Christianity. It's affected every part of my life, and I'm both damaged and wiser for that. Perhaps those things are one in the same. When I speak of conservative Evangelical Christianity, I speak of the Christianity that Nietzsche spoke against when he spoke of God being dead, and us having killed him. Through movement after movement, Christianity in the western world has fractured and created so many subgroups and become so fleshed out that it's fed back on itself. I haven't been to church beyond being obligated to go every once in a while for almost a decade now, despite my college's requirement that I attend in addition to the inundation of chapel every week (which I unashamedly say that I skirted around with every trick I could come up with). Christianity has become a system of indoctrination based around fear, but where could that fear come from? Why does the Roman Catholic Church feel the need to constantly announce its' stance on public issues? Why have Evangelicals tied themselves into multiple political movements (moral majority, pro-life, against legalizing gay marriage, pro-death penalty, pro-war). Why is it so confusing for someone to be called a politically liberal Christian in the south? Why do you get chain letters guilting you into forwarding them if you "love Jesus?"

Many will say that they aren't religious, they just love Jesus. I submit that this is impossible. When you even mention Jesus, you are making a religious claim. Even though he was arguably a historical figure, you're not just talking about that when say you "love Jesus." You're talking about the claim that he is divine, God in flesh, and that he is alive and well despite his historic death. You are claiming that you believe he resurrected from the dead and did the work of salvation (loaded term, by the way). Whether these claims are meant metaphorically or literally, you are still speaking using religious language. It is not escapable, and to say you aren't religious but then start teaching people about things from the Bible is even more of a contradiction, because the Bible, by nature, is a religious text.

Now, to get any further, we must do one of my favorite things.

Religion. A system of relating humanity to the spiritual world, sometimes through veneration of a religious figure(s). This can includes beliefs regarding metaphysics, morality, epistemology, history, and usually includes a metanarrative, or an explanation of all things by one single narrative structure.

Using this loose definition, we can conclude that the institutions created for the purpose of uniting or propagating religion are not religions themselves, but sometimes constitute new religions. Christianity is fascinating in this respect because of how many movements fall under its' wide umbrella. Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, the Latter Day Saints, Jehovah's Witnesses, the Protestants with their Pentecostals, Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Adventists, Non-Denominationals, Emergents, general Evangelicals, and hundreds of other subdenominations, Anglicans, and many other religious movements all claim to be Christian, because they in some way attempt to align with the teachings of Christ. The implications of this for each of them, however, create many different religious institutions, effectively. When people say they hate religion, they usually mean they hate religious institutions or movements. Unfortunately, when you make a religious claim publicly you are either part of a movement or creating one of your own, even if it's a movement of one.

So, growing up with my particular background in extremely conservative Evangelical Christianity, going to college was a refreshing and at once infuriating experience. I was faced with another religious institution with obvious agendas, and a lot of people with beliefs different from my own. Even after abandoning the traditions I had been brought up with, I still held their weight in my past, and I still came from that perspective, even if I was becoming farther removed from it every day. This lead to some of the most marvelous dissonance I've ever experienced. I could not stop myself from learning more, engaging more people, and thinking more, even when the authorities were screaming at me to stop. The interesting thing about this was how few of those authorities actually came to me personally and told me they were concerned. I can think of maybe twice where this happened, and both times I asked them what they were concerned about and we talked about it. Then, suddenly, they became confused as to why I was so dangerous.

So, if even a few people actually approached me and we talked and they ended up not thinking I was horrible, then why did that not end it? I imagine there are two reasons for this. First impressions, as they say, are the most important. The first impression I left at that school entered the gossip loop there, and quite a few people seemed to avoid me after we hung out for a few days, and a few of them even told me that they'd heard I didn't believe in the Trinity or something like that. I would then explain that I'd had some questions about it and had denied it at one point, but that was years ago. Once again, they were confused. Secondly, I think the authorities at my college were more interested in power and control than they were with understanding what is true, even about one person. One person is, after all, insignificant from this perspective. If they get run over and unfairly treated, it isn't their problem, even if they caused it.

This is why I am still skeptical of anyone making claims. They are usually only interested in power and control in one form or another.

We now have this dissonance of the inescapability of religion in light of my particular beliefs and the intolerable nature of all religious movements I've experienced due to people, in a nutshell, being disinterested in the truth and being bastards as much as possible about religion. The question then became, why? Furthermore, can religion escape its' abuses when it institutionalizes like this? If not, what is the point?

I've come much closer to an answer regarding the first question, and more of a functional answer regarding the last two.

Christianity in the western world has long been about fear. Indulgences were sold by the Catholic Church to get people out of hell (including yourself), sermons like "Sinners in the hands of an Angry God" were spoken and written, Evangelicals consistently ask people if they know what will happen when they die, and those are just a few examples. Hell, despite being very vaguely spoken about in the Bible (and having a variety of translation problems besides), has been one of the focal points of western Christianity. My experience with western Christianity suggests that they will soon call it a fundamental of their faith. The problem is, most of the imagery and theology behind hell comes from Dante's Divine Comedy and Paradise Lost. The only concrete fleshing out of hell and eschatology (the study of the end of the age) is the book of Revelation, a book so steeped in political metaphor and vague narrative that it is at once prophetic and tells you almost nothing regarding the actual nature of things. Jesus spoke of hell using multiple metaphors, and the Old Testament refers merely to the grave. Yet somehow, a lot of Christianity has made this central. There was even a huge backlash from the recent book "Love Wins" by Rob Bell, which was about Hell and was strikingly similar and inspired by "The Great Divorce" by CS Lewis, a book that was recommended to me over and over when I was at college. The difference? Lewis wrote in pure metaphor, and Bell wrote in questions. Questions are what is threatening to this movement because the leaders of it are afraid of losing their power and of their own God.

Can religion escape its' abuses? Or, perhaps more appropriately, does the abuse of religious systems negate their use? For sure, to speak of Christianity or any religion regarding only the negatives is fallacy, for many positive things have happened in the name of Christianity and of many religions. People have been given hope, treated with respect, and accepted for who they are. However, for every one of these occurrences, there is at least one occurrence of the opposite happening because that person is of a different religion/race/sexual orientation/creed/preference than the group at large. Having been rejected myself, I naturally notice the abuses first. I am glad for this in hindsight, but I do understand that there are some that are going through that rejection that are still very angry, and there are some who've never experienced this and may take things for granted. However, the question here is: can Christianity escape its' abuses and still be a religious system not plagued with self-contradiction? Furthermore, when we're talking about something so vast and varied, is this question even helpful? If we cannot make an argument against organized religion itself, then we must speak to Christianity in all of its' forms. Evangelicalism? No, I feel that it cannot escape its' contradictions and abuses. However, given my feelings regarding religious presupposition and intuitive spirituality, I also cannot escape being a religious person. It would be absurd for me to say that I am not religious, but I believe in God and Christ and the movement of Christianity.

So, the choice is pretty simple, from where I'm standing. Do I embark on this journey all on my own, eschewing all traditions and structure and traditions, or do I continue my search for people that have questions and problems with authority and have tried to overcome misanthropy and bitterness to talk in a real sense about real things without being stepped on, power struggles, or the contradictory fear? Both are appealing. I hope one is possible.

Regardless of the path I take, I believe that for people, forgiveness is absolutely essential. This is because when we allow ourselves to become bitter over the abuses we undergo as a person, we will continually react to them. It is fine to be emotional, but it is another thing entirely to continually react to a thing without taking into account new experiences, learning about things, and learning how wrong we have been about some things as a result. It is one thing to reject Evangelicalism and say I do not believe in that vengeful, angry, abusive God. It is another thing entirely to be angry at people and allow that to become bitterness and simmer on it constantly. I effectively destroy myself, and they have accomplished their goal of polarizing me one way or the other. I affirm the false dichotomy while saying things like "I hate religion but love Jesus" and wildly emotionally reacting to all things Evangelical, usually while saying absurdly ignorant things. Can you tell I've done this before?

I've had to forgive my high school, my college, Evangelicalism, most of the fear-mongering and broken leaders I've interacted with, and Christianity itself just to be able to move on. This does not mean I've forgotten my past (as you've seen), it means I can make informed decisions and be willing to change my mind without needing to be afraid or angry or reactionary.

Religion itself is a problematic thing because of the institutions associated with it. But to be religious, you must interact with those institutions, even if you're rejected by all of them. My divergent path is hence a false dichotomy. There is no finding a religious institution that is balanced without finding oneself, and there is no finding oneself without interaction with others. Because religion is a historical, spiritual, social, and intuitive phenomenon, it is impossible to be religious without interacting with the religion you are associated with. Even if the reason you are associated with your religion is cultural or developmental, you must continue to actualize that reason, question it and be critical and grow, lest you simply accept a set of claims that come to mean nothing. May it never be.

Being spiritual is not enough for me. Being a liberal Christian taught me that what is important is not what happened, but what happens. Being conservative for all of the years before that taught me that I can have passion. Choosing to be a Mystic Christian, accepting of mystery and experiences beyond my normal perception, is teaching me intuition and its' value, as well as the limitations of language and logic and my own feelings. Though the dichotomy between finding a religious community and pursuing my own spirituality is false, it is still a tension because of the problems of perception, institution, and abuse. However, if there is one true apostolic church that I've been looking for, I will find it. My own way.

Thanks for reading so far. I have more to say, but that will come next week, and I think it will be less linear than ever.

Moving Beyond Good and Evil: College, Universal Truth, and my Rejection of Evangelicalism

If there is one time in my life so far that has been key for shaping the person I was into the person I am, it would have to be my time at college. I've talked to a lot of people about this, but I think this is the first time I've actually come to have some perspective on all of those happenings.

Disclaimer: I don't portray my college or most of the religion I grew up with very well. This is by no means intended to be defamatory, it is simply what happened. You have been warned. Don't take it personally if you're involved in any of this.

Before I went to college, I had become good friends with the person I met in the 10th grade of high school. I'd go so far as to call him a mentor, which is a little odd, since he was about my age. Regardless, after my foray into public college, I decided to get a Counseling degree and to go to a Christian school. My friend decided similarly, but he'd be going for a more pastoral/theological path. So we looked at schools together, and we both decided to go to one particular Bible college in northeast Georgia. We went to their visitors session and it seemed to be a good fit, considering that we had begun to explore differing religious thoughts. This school seemed to be a cross-denominational institution that allowed for people with questions and freely exploring thought. So we decided to go there.

My first year at this school showed me how wrong my initial preconceptions of the place were. I don't know how much of my initial belief came from being lied to by the institution and how much was me needing to believe I could go somewhere and figure out who I am and what I believe, but I quickly found out that questions and exploration of religious thought was scary to most of the people at this school. I suppose I can't blame them, since I also quickly found out that they were definitely a conservative Evangelical institution. More on that later in this post.

In the first few months at this school, my friend and I became involved in the Philosophy club/department, and he ended up changing his major to Philosophy, while I stuck with Counseling. In many ways though, I interacted with the philosophy section of my school more than the counseling/psychology section. I signed up and became active on a forum for several years, declared a minor in Philosophy, and most of the people that heard of me at the school assumed my major was Philosophy.

I say that people heard of me because one of the first things my friend and I participated in was a formal debate hosted by the Philosophy Club. I reference this a lot as one of the key events of my College experience, for very good reason. The topic was the inerrancy of the original autographs of the new testament, and the club hosted this topic because we did not believe in Biblical inerrancy. I would come to term myself liberal around this time due to my religious leanings, which was a dirty word at my college, as were other things that I'd find out about later. However, for now, a definition.

Inerrancy. The belief that a book, usually religious, is without error in some way. The way my college and some conservative Evangelicals mean this term is that every word (plenary verbal) of the Bible (biblical) is inspired by God and without error (inerrancy). This runs into some problems when we consider the contradictory accounts of the gospels and the differing tones in the collection of books that is now called the Bible, not to mention the fact that the Bible did not exist until well after the death of the Apostles in the first Century.

Plenary Verbal Biblical Inerrancy rests on some references in the New Testament to "all scripture" being "God breathed," which is taken to mean inspired and inerrant. We argued against this on the grounds that the original manuscripts were no longer in existence, the contradictory accounts of the gospels, our understanding of church history and the canonization of scripture's time frame, and the simple fact that it cannot be proven. We won a pyrrhic and meaningless victory. Perhaps it would have been better if we had lost. Being freshman at a college, you can imagine our nervousness at being up in front of a lot of people at the school, including professors and board members and students and various others associated with the school, and debating against upper-classmen on a topic that 99% of the room disagreed with us about. That said, we obviously did very well bringing forward our argument to win the debate. We won on the grounds that we called out the circularity of the positive side in their reasoning and on the presentation of our argument in a logical and consistent manner.

We then spoke to the moderator of the debate in front of the audience about why we really believe our position and the implications for it, and then were presented with the results. The judge presenting our win corrected the positive team's error in reasoning to show that we were wrong by asserting that they did not escape circularity by claiming apostolic authority, and then a week later in the school paper there was a two part article by two of the judges about why our position is wrong, sub-Christian, and borderline heretical.

If you know me, you know that this caused me to do the exact opposite of falling in line with what I was supposed to believe. This also gave me a reputation that would stick with me for the entirety of my time at the school, as my friend left Christianity and the school shortly after to explore other options in life and religion. I never did renounce Christianity, though I did come very close following these events.

What followed was me trying to figure out some things, being told to have faith by a lot of people (apparently meaning to believe something despite reason), and generally stumbling around reading things and having conversations with people. I made some very good friends in college, and there was the standard social drama that came along with having a group of friends and with the college you attend being much closer to a small Christian high school experience than an academic institution.

We were required to go to chapel every week, 3 times a week and to attend a small group every Thursday at my school. I did this begrudgingly, and often I was put on "chapel probation" due to not attending chapel enough, which I had to work off by doing chapel summaries (watching a video of the chapel message and summarizing it to turn in) and by adequately attending chapel the next semester of school. I attended a few small groups, and ended up attending a really excellent one with some great people in charge of it. We'd go through some material and talk about it, then most of the time end up talking about our lives and praying for each other. Regardless of religious conviction, I find this small group to be one of the best things that happened to me at that school, as it was often then only time during the week besides hanging out with friends that I felt like people cared.

The administration of my school changed several times as well, and this was connected to a movement in evangelical Christianity called the Emerging Church. This movement is hard to define, but I got into it for several years in college. Basically, the Emerging Church as a movement has no set theology, and is a movement that embraces Postmodern culture. It is friendly to questions (which I desperately needed at the time), and loosely embraced Christianity as a very good story. Postmodernism, at its' core, is skeptical of metanarratives, which are stories that explain life. The Emerging Church is part of this, but in general seeks conversational change and community minded thought as opposed to a strict theological adherence and foundational epistemology. Confused yet? So was everyone else.

What this practically meant at my school was that people became opposed to each other. Some would hold fast to "true Christianity" and be conservative Evangelicals and call the "postmodern" section of the students liberal and heretical. The Emerging Church people would respond by saying they are shutting down conversation and would ask for definition. What this meant for me is that I generally sided with the Emerging Church movement, and I came to become very sensitive to the repeated accusation directed at me of "heretic."

I was told by many students and professors that I was a "false teacher" and that I was destroying other peoples' faiths, and somehow I was never kicked out of the school. To this day, I still don't know why I wasn't, and I can only conclude that the administration change (which caused a lot of people to get fired) may have been part of it. When the administration changed to a more "postmodern friendly" group of people, we were all required to sign a community covenant based on accountability and conversation with others. A lot of punishment for breaking school rules was abolished (including having to do some work on campus for free for most offenses, including failing room check), and in general, either you were talking to someone in administration or were kicked out of the school if you were in trouble. A lot of people were kicked out for things like drinking or clear violations of school rules. One of my friends was kicked out for repeated violation of the chapel policy. Somehow, I was still not kicked out, though I was now very frequently on "chapel accountability."

As often happens with movements like this, the administration went the other way after the chaos of the initial change and chose to follow a more moderate path. This was after 3 years. My experience at this time was being called heretical, fighting with people over things, having a few experiences with dating, having some good friends I could talk to, being basically infamous at the school, having to do a lot of the "free work" policy, and generally chaos around my beliefs. My friend who'd left the school wanted me to leave Christianity to explore some other religious movements more in line with gnosticism (which is ironic since a lot of American Evangelicalism is basically gnostic in practice), my friends were every which way, and the administration basically considered me unsaved, as did most of the rest of the school that didn't know me personally. Having a reputation is annoying.

I did not even try to figure out anything from all of this chaos. It was simply impossible. I made my beliefs a personal thing and stopped talking to anyone but close friends about philosophy, theology or my religious beliefs. Of course, this was hard at a school where you're basically supposed to talk about these things constantly, so I started to simply say what I needed to say to get through my classes and chapel. I began repeating to myself that no one cares what I have to say when someone's theology pissed me off or made me want to say something, and the only place I regularly went to debate topics was the Philosophy board, which I was still a part of for a time. I did that until a Professor told everyone I didn't care about the Truth, then I left. The board was hacked and taken down a while after that, and a new board was put up on the school's website for Philosophy discussion. I joined that and made a few topics. Half of my posts were deleted and I was basically told to stop talking, so I left that as well.

As the reader, you may now have one of two opinions that I can think of. You may be asking yourself why I even put up with Christianity anymore at this point and why I didn't just leave the school and say to hell with it. Good question. You may also think I should've just fallen in line with people that have more experience than me, people that were older, the majority, and wonder why I didn't just conform and learn from people. Also a good question. In either case, I think the core question is "why did you put yourself through so much of this unreasonable insanity?" I asked myself this question frequently. Here is my answer.

When I first started having some difficulty with the religion I'd been brought up with, I considered leaving it. I thought it was a fable that a lot of people believe because of culture. However, something was really bothering me about that assertion. I'm not sure if it was because of the way I was brought up or some other feeling, but I did know a few things. My family and some really really close friends have always contrasted with my terrible experiences I've had with religious institutions. They were not uniform in belief by any means. My father is Reformed, my mother has a lot of the same thoughts I do about religion, my sister is in the process of asking her own brilliant set of questions, and a lot of the people I respect have religious beliefs entirely different from mine. Some are conservative Evangelicals, some are postmodern Emerging Church, some are atheists, some don't care about movements and have their own beliefs. The common thread is that they respect every person around them. Their beliefs and claims do not take away from that respect, they don't take cheap shots at people, they don't take advantage, they're self-aware and generally respectful and well-intentioned people.

I learned from this that my religious convictions needed to align with how I treat people. I believe very deeply that every person is worthy of basic respect. They are a person, and they should not be manipulated, taken advantage of, stepped on in any way, or disregarded. This does not mean you allow yourself to be taken advantage of, it means that you do the correct thing when no one else does.

I also read a book early on in my questioning called Velvet Elvis. I was ready to leave Christianity, and a friend recommended this book by Rob Bell (who a lot of people have called a heretic for reasons that have nothing to do with reality). This book basically took things like a triune God and an inspired set of writings from the ancient near-east and interacted with them with skepticism and facts from history. It also was my introduction to narrative theology, treating something like the Trinity as a story, which I still assert is the only way it makes any sense whatsoever.

From this I learned that theology and religion have no context whatsoever outside of history, narration, and intuition. I also concluded that science and religion are two languages talking about the same thing: the universe. This would stick with me as I have interacted with the differing branches of the church, differing religions than what I grew up with, and especially different philosophies. It was very freeing because I'd been taught growing up that religion is an intellectual decision, and I absolutely refuse to ever believe that again. It interacts with logic and philosophy, but that is by no means all of what it is.

Why did I stick it out? For two reasons. First of all, I had a sense that I was in the right place at the right time. Even when my days were mostly terrible, I knew I was doing some good just by creating dissonance where uniformity is demanded. Secondly, once that time was done I wanted to finish what I started, so I put my head down and plowed through it. I graduated and promptly cut the institution out of my life completely, with the exception of the friends I made there. I believe I've visited once since then, and I never plan to again. While I enjoyed seeing some friends, I was very obviously not welcome at the institution, and I will not willingly be back there ever again. Some things belong in the past, regardless of forgiveness. It took me a long time to forgive what was done to me, but being able to do so has allowed me to see how I grew during that time and why I am who I am after going through those experiences.

From all of the chaos of transitioning from high school through my college experience, I have learned that the truth is what all people should give their allegiance to. Regardless of my particular religious beliefs, I want to know what the truth is.

All of this said, about halfway through my time at college, I basically rejected Evangelical Christianity completely.

Evangelicalism. Evangelicalism is a movement originating in early fundamentalism that initially crossed denominational Protestant lines and came to stand for a certain set of focuses and practices. The "fundamentals" of Christianity are the inspiration/inerrancy of scripture, the Virgin Birth of Christ, the belief in the Atonement for Sin by Christ's death, the bodily Resurrection of Christ, and the historical reality of Christ's miracles. They also emphasize the need for personal conversion (being "born again"), biblical authority, the death and resurrection of Christ, and the active sharing of the gospel, which can be summed up in all of the previous emphases and an intellectual decision to accept guilt for sin and Christ as the sacrifice for salvation.

Over time, Evangelicalism has become a cultural, political, and religious institution that wields a unique kind of power. I rejected Evangelicalism due to its' wielding of power for its' own ends and mainly due to rejecting its' particular theological emphases as reductionistic and imbalanced. What this means is that I came to see Evangelicalism as another movement of people looking to have control over others, using fear-based proselytization and theology with disturbing implications about God. The Evangelical God is much the same as the movement: conditional love, manipulative and capricious, and more concerned with a person's legal standing than the person itself.

The overriding reason I began to disassociate from Evangelicalism, however, is because of its' activism. I do not believe it is my place to convert any person to my faith (mainly because I'm still figuring it out). The Emerging Church redefined evangelism as conversation, and I found that I resonated with that a lot more at the time, mainly because I learn just as much from speaking with people that don't share my beliefs as they learn from me, especially when the conversation can be respectful.

So in a nutshell, Evangelicalism is a separationist movement that created its' own culture and set of values, being generally concerned with who is "in" and who is "out." Through my experience with this subculture, I began to see less and less of any real distinction between the "in" and the "out," and in many cases, I shared more values with those that the Evangelical would be attempting to evangelize with fear based tactics. Separationists are those who believe that they should stand apart from liberal Christians, who do not take theology or the Bible as literally. So obviously, I became one of the "out" in college.

Being an outsider does give one a unique perspective however. I held onto my faith through my own choice, though it was never the same after college. That, however, is a story for another day. Please note that I have a lot of friends that are Evangelicals, and even though I criticize the movement itself, I do not believe it is my place to pass judgment on the intentions of others.

Indeed, I can write about this with a critical mind only because I forgive the institutions and persons involved for the pain I went through. It is the past, but the past is something good to learn from. I'll continue my story with the rest of my college experience next week. Please leave me a comment if you have any questions or comments.

The Beginning: Fear, Hell, and Deterministic Philosophy

Disclaimer: Writing about this section of my life has brought back a lot of memories and emotions. Indeed, I contemplated deleting this entire post and creating a summary of it for my upcoming college experiences post. However, I think this part of the story is beneficial, and I stand by it, despite being not proud of a lot of the person I was.

Like all stories, this one has a beginning. This is the closest thing my fragile memory can deliver to that beginning.

I was raised in Conservative Evangelical Christian subculture. I said the Sinner's Prayer at age 7 because I was afraid of burning in hell because of a sermon from the Fundamental Independent Baptist Church I went to at the time. For those not aware, the Sinner's Prayer is a fundamental admission of guilt to God and accepting of Salvation in a prayer. Some believe God hears no prayers of anyone until the Sinner's Prayer. My understanding of reality at that time was that I was probably going to die at any moment, and if I didn't say this prayer, I would suffer for eternity, and there would be no way to stop it.

I vaguely remember having a few thoughts after that experience, such as wondering why God would do such a thing, what made me such a terrible person, and wondering what hell was like and why it existed. I even had a dream about hell once. I thought I was in heaven, and then I discovered that this beautiful celestial (stereotypical) heaven was not what I thought it was and that I was actually in hell, at which point I was thrown into a void and ceased to exist.

The thoughts of a child are powerful, illogical, and often-times they shape who they are. For me though, this was only the beginning.

Besides this underlying fear, I don't remember a huge amount of my life before age 15. I remember having friends in elementary school, moving schools in the 7th grade, and then moving states from North Carolina to Georgia in the 9th grade. Note that all of these schools were Private Christian Institutions, and I'd moved from a more Fundamentalist institution to a standard Southern Baptist one in the 7th grade. I then went to a standard Evangelical high school. I figured I'd be the popular and happy person I was in my new school.

I was totally wrong. I could not have been more wrong. I spent the first week of high school being made fun of and made to feel like an outsider. I didn't dress correctly, I didn't fit in, most of the teachers were angry about one thing or another, and I generally came to believe I was scum and no one liked me. I came home after the first week crying saying I hated it, but for one reason or another I stuck it out. I had one good friend in the 9th grade (who is still one of my best friends to this day), and the rest were either acquaintances, tormentors, or didn't care that I existed. The only other exception to this is someone I met in the 10th grade who strongly influenced me, who I will get to in a moment.

We were required to go to Chapel every Wednesday at this school. One Wednesday after my 15th birthday a guest speaker came and gave a message about hell and encouraged fear. He called himself prophetic, and was accusatory and derogatory in every sense of the word. I was once again seized by fear, thinking my decision was not genuine enough when I was 7 years old, that I didn't understand enough and didn't know enough to really be saved. So he gave an altar call and I performed. I gave an emotional display and prayed to be saved. People were happy for me. He came back when I was in the 12th grade and gave the exact same message and I thought he was an emotionally manipulative jerk. But I digress.

Nothing really changed for me that first year. I hung out with my one friend a lot, and he eventually left the school, along with a lot of others. I made another friend in the 10th grade, and he challenged me over the next several years in every possible way. The rest of my high school experience was basically meaningless, as it was an endless attempt to deal with not fitting in. I became involved in a few music scenes, got very angry, and expressed that a lot by acting out, as a teenage boy who doesn't know his place is prone to do. My parents are incredible for putting up with me, especially the "I will listen to hate-filled angry music all the time and be a jerk to everyone" stage.

As you can imagine, with all of these circumstances and changes going on my theology and purely emotional religious convictions changed a good bit. I became Reformed and believed in 7 point Calvinism, having been inspired to do so by one of my teachers. For those who don't really understand what 7 point Calvinism, it is the TULIP anagram with two extra clarifications. Total Depravity - man is incapable of any moral or spiritual good and is completely broken. Unconditional Election - people are chosen by God according to His good pleasure to be part of the elect. Limited Atonement - Christ's sacrifice on the cross paid only for the elect's sins. Irresistible Grace - the elect will choose to be saved and cannot resist doing so. Perseverance of the Saints - once you are elect, you will persevere to the end and cannot possibly fall away. Double Predestination - God predestines all who are not elect for Hell, and they have no choice in the matter. Best of all Possible Worlds - God's absolute sovereignty over history is exercised to display his glory to the fullest, and he governs every detail to this end.

I believe the craziest moment of all of this was arguing in front of my class that babies go to hell if they die because of original sin, predestination, and their lack of saying the sinner's prayer. If you're not horrified by that, I can still feel plenty of horror over it for you. At the time, it made perfect sense because of God's sovereignty. I had a very deep problem with people in general at that time, so I did not care if anyone hated me for my beliefs or thought I was terrible, citing that "true Christians" are persecuted.

I was basically reformed until I graduated from high school. During this time, I'd had a falling out with the friend I met in the 10th grade, but we became friends again after I graduated. He had gotten into some things I could not agree with, and we kind of went opposite directions. However, once we began associating again, we started a Bible Study group about the fundamentals of Christian faith. Prooftexting the Bible, we talked about who God is and some of the core beliefs, seeking to educate people. I then went to my first college and discovered it was not what I wanted to do, and left after one semester.

At this point we restarted the Bible Study, but with an entirely different tone, one that I feel really changed my direction from where I had been religiously. I recall the exact moment of this change vividly, because my friend was the first person to ever tell me that the Bible is not inerrant.

As you can imagine, I argued with him immediately. My religious world not only had its' foundation kicked out from under it once I realized he was right, but everything else crashed down, got set on fire, and I was stuck in the middle trying to figure out what was going on. I was then even more angry and did a total 180 right before attending another Christian institution. Readers may be forced to ask at this point...do I ever learn? The hard way, always. My college time is a whole other post, and I will talk about the shift my personal philosophy and religion took in that post as well.

So, to sum this up. For the first 19 years or so of my life, I was intensely afraid and often felt alone, angry, or both. The exceptions to this were my family (always) and the one really good friend I met when I first went to high school. This time was full of thinking about hell and God's wrath and sovereignty over all things. I went from one church to another, but essentially the core of my beliefs was centered around these things. I don't see it as a coincidence that I was Reformed in high school, as it was a method of not only rebelling, but also of trying to hold onto something solid (God's sovereignty) in a time when I didn't know what to do and felt powerless. In retrospect, it didn't help that much.

Upon initially drafting this post, I began to talk about why I disagree with Reformed Theology and Determinism. I don't find that to be a helpful direction to go at this point (if you would like me to talk about this, please say so in the comments). I didn't make the decision to be Reformed for any logical reason. I did so out of a need to rebel because I was afraid. This tone of fear in my life would continue until it was addressed, but what I find interesting is that my philosophy became one that made everyone powerless. Just as I was powerless to stop the injustice I faced on a daily basis, I decided everyone else is powerless too. I clung to the God of vengeance and anger and when I was treated unfairly, I believed that God would get revenge on them for it and that they also could not stop it. One might accurately observe at this point that my God was really myself, and I was plotting deterministic vengeance, using theology as my grounds.

Determinism. The view that choices, actions, and events are a natural and inevitable result of an initial cause. Theologically, God is the initial cause, and all choices and all of history are illusionary and destined from the beginning of time. Psychologically, a person is who they are due to their first 3-5 years of their life, and can be no one else.

In contrast to this view, I believe that a person is shaped continually by their view of truth, just as much as they shape it. Our actions are not determined by our initial experiences, but by our continual interaction with life and the choices we make in it. One could probably argue that my high school experience made a lot of sense in light of my initial experiences with religion, but I would hope that you the reader do not think this as you continue to read this series. That's your call though.

Regardless, my view of truth in high school made me a very angry person, and I imagine that while a lot of my problems were due to ignorance and the atmosphere I was surrounded with, I believe that I caused just as many of them with my divisive beliefs and my hateful attitude. When my beliefs came crashing down after high school, it was one of the best things that had ever happened to me. I was free from needing to justify myself to anyone, and I was able to move beyond the foundational philosophical framework of Conservative Evangelicalism and explore some other beliefs.

I would come back to my origins as I moved onto college, but suffice it to say, it was apparent to me at this point that I had learned more in spite of my experience with religion than through it. If only I had known what would come next...