Believing for the wrong reasons (maybe?)

I’ve been having a good conversation in my comments on Teetering Faith (oh, I know that’s a bad thing…I shouldn’t have blog comment wars but it’s just so easy to slip into), and I think that this kind of dialogue helps me to clarify my feelings on the issue.

The comments have been so far church oriented. It asks me if my church is in the right place or the wrong place. Is it teaching the right things or the wrong things?

I guess that’s a good question. It might be helpful to ask, “Does your church focus on spirituality or does it focus on organization and tack spirituality on?”

But what if I can answer, “It focuses on spirituality, but that’s the part I hate”? Indeed, I think that is my answer and that’s what I tried to reach at in Teetering Faith. I’m at odds with mainstream religion, not just my religion, because instead of focusing on the good that people can do, it focuses on the invisible, undetectable beings who tell us to do good things and the invisible rewards we may get in the next life from doing good things. It focuses on the invisible way we must live our lives — faith — instead of using our senses to determine what we know is right or wrong.

I like my church — and I find value in churches — because they give a logical organization or a logical structure to people’s lives. If churches are good, then they are good because they bring about meaningful good consequences in people’s lives. I used to feel at odds with religion because one “meaningful good consequence” — faith — was absent. I couldn’t hear anything back. I didn’t feel anything from reading about spiritual passages. I don’t cry at things like that. I’m spiritually cold. And I have no problem with that.

What keeps me coming back is recognizing that even though many churches are misguided into believing that religion should be about crying at Jesus’s suffering or praying 90 billion times a day, some churches are enlightened enough to realize that religion should be about giving practical advice to people.

This is a conundrum. A big one. You see…most theologians — professional or arm-chair variety — will agree that regardless of whether you believe in faith + works or faith alone, you can’t *just* believe in works.

I’m not saying I only believe in works, and I’m not saying I was taught that way. However, what if faith escapes you? Are you ineligible for true salvation? What if the way you look at the benefits of religion is in a tangible — dare I say secular — way? Are you believing for the wrong reasons? The problem is lots of churches say you should be believing just because, and instead I’m believing because it makes sense. I reason that as soon as something ceases to make sense, I can drop it like a bad habit.

The funniest thing is…I’ve tried going to other places (that’s what I like about *my* church — it tells you to try other places out if you aren’t sure)…and then I realize that other churches are barbaric. You aren’t a person; you are a soul to be preyed upon. Heck, 90% of religious conversations anywhere devolve into this barbaric melee, because you never were a person but a soul to be preyed upon. Your views obviously are wrong and you must be converted immediately.

Why stick with it? Why not just say, “Bye”? Well…the problem is that, for now, I still believe. Even if for the wrong reasons. I don’t go to another church because I don’t agree with them and I don’t just ditch everything and go my own path because that doesn’t seem legitimate to me yet. I remain in limbo. It’s a good place not to change things.