So on the drive back home from work tonight I realized why I have so much trouble believing in (a) God...
I remember when I was little if I saw something supernatural (say, a magic flying carpet), though I might have believed in it at the time, when I grew up I knew that it just wasn't possible. Not really.
A better analogy is this. Nowdays if I watch a magic show, if I see something that's just too good to be true, some great magic, well I know there's a trick to it. It's not *really* like that. I know that behind it, there's a really simple, and most importantly, logical explanation.
Applying that to religion, in a sense, I feel like it is just too easy of an answer. That if the magic trick was equivalent to the problems in this world, then that simple explanation that would make sense is equivalent to a God, who could make it all go away. It just seems too ... easy.
It reminds me of a term I learned in lang, deus ex machina (sp?)*. It's basically when all seems hopeless (and the author wants to end it quickly imo), some magical solution appears that normally couldn't/wouldn't happen, well, happens.
But I wonder where my block is coming from. I mean, I know this is the stem of it, but the root?
:Sigh:
I was at work today, and I went to a different building to do some menial work. Anyway, I got to talking (as I do) with some of the other workers and well, somehow we got on the topic of ... oh I remember now. We were talking about the blood drive next week and whether or not we were goign to give blood. Then they were asking about engineered blood and cloning. Anyway, one of the workers said that she didn't believe they should do it, that some things should just be left alone. Another guy said he agreed, and that anything they made wouldn't have a soul, a conscience. He said that only God could give that. Etc. Etc.
I guess my point in bringing up this story is that, it just surprised me how easily they mentioned God, how clearly He was a part of their life. It seemed their belief in a God was solid. I just can't fathom how people put their faith in er... things. I mean, what does that speak of me? Where/what I put my faith in?! Actually, what do I put my faith in?
* Yay I'm right. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deus_ex_machina
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ever considered the possibility of you overthinking the problem? like we all do sometimes on a math test
ReplyDeletewell, life isn't really a math test either :P
... yeah you're going to have to expand on that. such as, why that's not important to think/wonder about. how that's overthinking. what it's really like. something like that
ReplyDeletethat a really interesting way of thinking about religion. i wouldn't be surprised if you were right about religion just being an easy answer.
ReplyDeletedon't feel bad if you find it hard to put faith in things. i don't think it shows bad character or anything like that. it's the same with any personality trait - you either have it or you don't. some people can study with noise around them and some can't. some people can believe in things and some can't.
finally come back and see that response
ReplyDeletewell, I am not saying it's not important to think about it but rather it's possible to overthink.
by overthinking I think I meant to say "trying too hard to rationalize/connect all the pieces of information logically when there is really no need (even no way?) to do so"
I guess I like using math examples even though they are not really a good analog of life. I believe you've heard about that someone "proved" 1+1=2? I'd say that's some overthinking because pretty much everyone accept that as true and there's no need to do so.
As for religion, I don't think there is one religion that everyone believe in/accept as true. Thus there is a need to think through and make sense of all the pieces logically. But I don't think there is really a way to. At least I don't know a way to argue logically and soundly that certain religion is The Truth. Also, some of the doctrine that religions hold "true" really cannot be proven true physically (e.g. God exists and He created the world in the ancient ancient time). And there's no way to say that everything following that particular truth is true since we don't even know if the premise is true. In this sense, I'd say that trying too hard to think through everything by using logic or deductive reasoning is really overthinking.
And yes, I agree that religion involves emotions and "feelings" and thinking and reasoning. But I believe that "faith" is a very important part of it. One definition of "faith" in the mw dictionary is "firm belief in something for which there is no proof". I think that's somewhat true since there's really no direct proof of God's existence. Or I should say I don't know how to link the proofs to God's existence. Take the proofs in evolution, all that theories based on biological observation and fossil evidence, why can not the same proofs be used to say that "oh yes, God created everything according to its kind and that's why there are so much similarities from species to species" or "oh yes, only God can design the simple natural rules that works together so perfectly that such complex biological systems comes out of it" ?
I don't really have any good logical argument for my religion, but I'm willing to interpret from my observations and knowledge that God exists and Christ points out the one way to Him.