Religion, Spirituality, Higher Power.... It's All a Mystery to Me, Not too Mention a Matter of Faith

My last couple of posts have skirted the issue of religion, usually with me saying something along the lines of "I'm not all that religious." Frankly, I tend to stay away from the discussion because there are far too many viewpoints, interpretations, and people who think they have all the answers to the afterlife. My personal belief is that there simply isn't enough information to form a suitable hypothesis one way or another, and people get far too heated when discussing something so personal. And so, I try to stay far away from discussions of religion unless the discussion is of an academic nature, when feelings are less likely to be hurt.

Notice my use of the word "try" because I'm going to delve, somewhat foolishly I'm sure, into the realm of religion, or if you prefer spirituality, or faith, or the afterlife (see, too many ways to address the issue).

Anyway, I am no religious scholar, nor do I pretend to be; however, I do try to rely on my reason, intuition, and experience as much as possible before making any kind of decision. I believe I've always waited before making decisions: The more serious the decision, the longer the wait. Of course, this waiting tends to push the limits on things like deadlines and life in general. A patient child I was, which has translated into being a patient adult, as well. I guess it's a good thing I was called to the profession of teaching. Since waiting is one of my more powerful characteristics, I feel I will be waiting until the end of my life to make a decision on my faith.

My parents always told my sister and me that we had a choice which religion to follow. Now, they may have hoped for a Christian denomination of some kind, and probably hoped against a more pagan form of spirituality like Wicca, a religion I did flirt with for a time and still have a few books on the subject. However, it is this freedom of choice that has plagued me for my whole life. This is not to say I feel my parents did me a disservice. On the contrary, I believe their decision to give my sister and me a choice at all has led me to seriously, and I mean seriously, consider the role religion would take in my life. From the moment a choice was presented, I was free to question what many take on faith and faith alone. I was free to question how comfortable, or uncomfortable, I felt in the hallowed halls of various churches. My favorites tended to be Catholic because Catholics tend to take the presentation of religious rites and practices VERY seriously, which also is a reason why many are turned away from Catholicism. I found the grandeur and pomp to be a form of elevation, like Milton's use of language in Paradise Lost: the subject deserves a higher form of presentation.

Of course, to each his own. The form of presentation makes a difference to us all and not all of us react the same. Some love the language of Paradise Lost and other epic poetry, while others do not. The Catholic form of delivery was suitable to my own tastes. But this is not to say I now find myself a true Catholic; after all, because I never decided on one particular faith, I never went through the necessary rituals of being a true Catholic. No, there was a slight hiccup in the development of my faith, what I'll lovingly call my gay realization. Here was a dilemma set in front of me: How do I reconcile being gay with belonging to a religion?

To start, I need to explain a bit. I apologize on the outset about the brief bit of history I'm about to divulge, but for the sake of this particular blog I feel it's necessary.

There are plenty of people out there who believe being gay is a choice, and I'm the first to say that yes, it can be a choice, but that's not to say it is always a choice. Human psychology is far too varied and complex to limit personal identifications to black/white standards. For me, it's not a choice. Sorry ladies, I just don't find woman sexually appealing. Even when I was little and acting out the role of obsessed male adolescent, I had a couple of pictures of beautiful women (I had a thing for Sandra Bullock.... still do as a matter of fact), but none that I can recall were in provocative poses. Indeed, my own feelings about them were a bit strange, I began to notice.

I believe it all started with a simple movie, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. In an earlier post, I expressed that I had a crush on the older boy in the film. I wanted to be the girl in the film not because I desired to be a woman but because I desired to be in her shoes. I wanted him. The same probably... No, it did happen with Ms. Sandra Bullock. She had starred in Speed (just a quick FYI, Speed was the first R rated film my parents let me own) and I believe my fascination with her was due to her close proximity to a hunky looking Keanu Reeves, who wouldn't look so scrumptious again until The Matrix.

My apologies, I digress. These feelings weren't driven by any kind of sexual abuse, or fear of women. No, they were just there. I couldn't control them then, and I can't control them now. My dilemma then, and to some extent now, is that if I accepted the idea that I was born attracted to men and if I accepted the idea that most religious doctrine doesn't look too kindly on same-sex coupling, what was I to do? This was a terrifying mental state for a teenager just starting junior high school. How is an adolescent, with very little life experience and knowledge of religion and philosophy, supposed to deal with those kinds of issues? To be perfectly honest, it's no wonder there is such a high rate of suicide among GLBT youth. Now, I'm not blaming religion, but the pressures exerted on our youth today is immense, especially when the pressure is coming from the institutions that are supposed to help teens deal with such issues.

Well, those were my thoughts. Just as I was supposed to be discovering the joys of love, I was terrified I was going to hell. But something didn't feel right about all of it. God is supposed to be all powerful. God tests us with temptation. God is vengeful. God is merciful. All of this didn't seem to add up to my adolescent mind. To use the language of adolescents, God is a sick fucker.

At least, that's how I felt.

How could all of these ideas be merged together into one being. Well, the answer lies in the first item in my list above: God is omnipotent. God encompasses everything in us and outside us, which means God's infinite complexity includes the psychological complexities of humanity. As some decide to murder, so does God. As some decide to give, so does God.

I was told once by a friend, a pair of friends actually, that my sexuality was a sign from God to take a vow of abstinence and join the priesthood. I politely declined, while simultaneously thinking "Hell, no!" Abstinence is a nice idea but a failure in practice, and I knew I would fail miserably, even if the study of religious texts seemed a promising career choice, which it did; I'm a nerd after all.

All these ideas proved too much for my mind, so I decided to just forget about it all. I decided I was an Atheist.

I was a junior in high school.

Thankfully, my boyfriend at the time informed me that that wasn't such a good idea. An outright rejection of God, in whatever form, was not a reasonable way to approach the problem, and he introduced me to a new word: Agnostic.

Agnostics, of course, are by nature "fence sitters", which I'm sure is frustrating for all those who so blissfully exist on either side of the divide. Even so, an agnostic I remain to this day. Even though my knowledge has expanded a bit since my junior year, I can't quite get off the fence. Granted, I lean more toward the believers than the non-believers, however I just can't subscribe to any particular doctrine. All are too limiting to my conception of God. Even the name "God" and its variations seems too limiting for the power in the universe that is simultaneously destroyer and creator, the beginning and the end. God is too vast for our simple minds to comprehend, even if we were immortal. The knowledge we seek will not become a part of our consciousness until that consciousness is no longer attached to the limitations of the human body, miracle in engineering though it is.

Some will argue that the power that is God makes itself know to us through religious texts. But which should I choose? I mean really, even within one religion there are texts that are considered gospel and others that are not. What's the difference? And who has the authority to make such a decision to either include or dis-clude any particular text? I know I'm not qualified. However, I do have a problem with the strict adherence of any religious text for the simple fact that they are mere translations. Anyone who has had experience with translation can tell that it's not an exact art. And I'm including the originals in this context, too. After all, they were but the writings of men who had particularly potent dreams. Have you ever tried to write down a dream after waking? I enjoy writing and it's like trying to hold onto a watermelon dripping with oil. Elements change with the writing, so who can say if the man (for most older religious texts were written by men) got it right?

There's far too much instability in religious texts for my liking, and so I'll remian blissfully on-the-fence until my soul makes a break for nothingness or the next realm. Either way, I'll continue to grow and expand my knowledge of our world; and I'll continue to act in a way that harms no one. In the end, whether you believe or not, our actions on this earth have consequences.