I don’t speak often about religion or faith in general. I find that some people have a closed mind when it comes to believing in something that cannot be see or touched. My church taught that God expects us to stray and forever leaves the path open to return. I believe that when allowed to experience the good and the bad, we generally migrate toward the good…it just fits better that way.
Tell us about the role that faith plays in your life — or doesn’t.
I have a lot of faith in a lot of things, but faith in people is not one of them. One would like to people that as intelligent beings we would do the right thing. This doesn’t always happen. Historically, I have learned through experience that faith is a blind trust. When I needed surgery some time passing, I had this type of trust in my surgeon. It never occurred to me that they might do something wrong that resulted in my death. I trust that civil services will be there when I need them to be. When I called for an ambulance after my neighbor fell in his driveway, it never touched my mind that the ambulance would not arrive. When we called the fire department for a chimney fire across the block, it never crossed my mind that they would not come. My son did cross the yards to rouse the elder man that lived in the house. His smoke alarms were going off, but he was hearing impaired and did not notice. It isn’t that I trust the individual that came to help, but rather I held a blind trust in the way things are expected to happen. Faith works that way.
When we believe that things will go as intended, we have faith. When we realize the nature of a situation and understand the logic of the outcome, we have faith. When something happens out of sequence or without reason, we lose faith. We tend to blame our failure to realize the event or results on something other than ourselves. Nature repeats itself all around us and it is in our nature to trust in that repetition. When an event disrupts that natural flowing repetition, we lose our balance and focus. It is miracle if it is an unexpected good thing: a simple will of God if it is a devastating bad thing.
I have been known to sink defeated into a chair and utter the words, “God hates me.” I do know the truth of it. God does not hate. I am only feeling less powerful for my failure to see what was coming. It happens. Saying the words takes the blame off me and places it with someone that will not point out the truth of it. The strongest role that faith plays in my life would be that it takes away some of the worry. By placing my trust with things that always happen the same way every time, all the time, I can focus on those things that are chaotic and unreasonable.
In my humble opinion, in order to have faith in other people, one has to start on oneself. I know you have faith in you and I to you. Happy New Yeas.