Pursuing Faith

It was always whenever you're down with problems from work, finances, health, and family stuff that a person tends to finally find time to cross examine one's spiritual self.

Whenever I look back in my life, I always somehow feel uncomfortable to discuss my own personal spiritual journey...


SEEDS OF SKEPTICISM

I started of, being born in a typical middle class filipino catholic family. Our family's conservative and somewhat restricted views on religious beliefs did nothing but planted the initial "seedlings" of uncertainty in me as a child.

Maybe its because I'm just a naturally curious kid, but growing up, I already have some dissatisfaction over how some of the basic religious tenets being taught at church or school sometimes just doesn't always make sense to me. I also know that most of the adults in my life were on the same boat that I was in...

I do not exactly remember when it happened, but around the time when I lost my grandma to cancer, despite fervent prayers and my zealot like faith (yes I was a fanatic catholic back then), I've succumb to atheism.

Maybe it was just an immature, hormone laden, teenage renegade phase that I was on at the time, but I remember that I was just impossibly upset and angry at god.

I was so fired up that years of repressed questions over religious dogmas just instantly sprung out , like a tightly wounded coil unraveling in an instant, I felt like a whistling teapot left boiling for an hour, spurting, screaming, and blasting it's lasts load of steam...

I took my atheism quite seriously, even to the point of physically engaging over intellectual discourses that I feel that theists people needed to be rescued from the bondage that is religion

At that time, I was literally convinced that god was simply a figment of our imagination, like unicorns, fairies, santa claus, etc. I was so engorged by anger and helplessness that I've engaged in any intellectual discourse I can afford just to prove and profess the atheistic point-of-view. I even managed to "convert" some of my friends and family over to atheism.

CAJOLING SENSIBILITIES

For years (even after having my own family), I was completely convinced that the realization that a life without a prime mover had set me free --- being absconded by years of rituals, traditions, and reverence that was forced to you soon as you can speak, I felt empowered and respectable.

It has indeed taken a fair length of time before I finally stepped down my high horse and literally "reasoned" my way back to faith.

My views on spirituality and religion at that time was against any type, form, or affiliation. Admittedly though, my arguments were mostly targeted against Catholicism and the judaeo-christian views.

After years of living an altruistic and secularized life though, I finally confounded myself that the real reason that I accepted atheism was because I was lashing out to the God. After that, the fear of rejection simply spring loaded my ego that I since I've been such a proletarian asshole all this years, getting back in God's "good graces" sounded more like a death sentence.

Remembering graphic biblical stories and depiction about how God regularly allow his faithful to be "tested" gave me more reason to hold-on to secular skepticism. I mean, the prospect of penitence from years of blaspheming and the notion that unspeakable horrors of being subjected to "tests" forced me not to reconcile my atheism for a very long time.

Maybe I was too coward or too indisposed from fear that I fear that the idea that once I re-establish my faith, God will go out and test me particularly in areas of my life that I personally know I wouldn't have any chance to pass.... Imagery of horrifying scenarios that has anything to do with my kids or my family is what I feared most (think of the story of Abraham or Lot from the Bible and you'll probably guess what I meant).

Having said that though, in all that time, I felt insecure over a lot of things. For consolation, I would gravitate to the the proposition that everything can be explained and rationalized by the human mind and therefore I don't need divine emancipation, period.

Soon enough though, I found it a constant battle to repress the longing for a greater point-of-view; something with substance or design which can bridge rationale and still satisfy my inert skepticism. An example is why religious people exhibits a certain air of nostalgia and peace despite leading lives permeated in crisis or confronting terrible circumstances beyond any plethora of human rationality. It doesn't make sense to me how in the face of absolutely horrific end, they seem to be accepting and rejoicing the conditions that they were dealt!

The reason I held on to atheism so long is because it offered a point of view that was simply suitable to my situation at the time. Like rationalizing how a new person deserved a promotion more because he was simply more effective or productive, as opposed to choosing a tenured individual who everybody knows is well entrenched and familiar to the inner workings and decision makers in the organization. I feel a sense of betrayal when 5-months after their promotion, people leave to a much higher paying job, without a sense of guilt or loyalty...

Simple things, ideas and events like that which transpired as I progressed in life, lacked the merit that bolstered skepticism and rationalization can offer. Ideas outside of secular religious topics simple doesn't make a suitable topic to apply under atheistic precepts.

RATIONALIZED THEISM

As I grow older, I found it hard not to go back to secular teachings and find enlightenment, where a couple of years earlier, I was completely mocking. It simply just made more sense as years come and went in ways that I can never really understand.

In the end, I found my way back to the Christian fold because of the overwhelming skepticism I had over atheism and its views, which ironically were the same traits that led me to lose my faith in the first place.

So to end this post, I say, go ahead, open yourself up to skepticism and critical reason. Lay your secular beliefs and virtues under rational scrutiny. If your strong enough, and never stop searching for the truth.... I wouldn't be too surprised to find yourself re-acquainted with your faith some time down the line.