Frequenters of my blog will know that I do, on occasion, talk about stuff other than movies, TV shows, books, etc. This post is gonna be one of those posts, but because I'm me, here's a link.
So that title up there can and does mean probably a hundred different things to a hundred different people.
And that's hardly a great place to start a conversation from, but hey, here I am. Starting it anyway. To that end, I'd like to slap some definitions in place. You frequenters (yes, that's your name now) may recognize this as being one of the things I do under the "etc" portion of the list above, but I promise it's not the meat of what I'm going after here. More like the... fur. Or something.
New Oxford American: Faith - 1) complete trust of or confidence in someone or something. 2) strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof.
I'd like to point out that "apprehension" as used in the second definition dates from the early 14th century meaning "perception or comprehension" instead of the "dreadful anticipation" definition you're probably all familiar with. That dates from the early 17th century. And yes, I did get some etymology into this post, of course I did. That's always an option. All blog posts have words.
Now you've probably guessed, considering there's nothing particularly interesting in the etymological evolution of a word that has remained fundamentally unchanged since its origins in Latin (seriously, how dull), that I'm here today focused on that second definition. I'd like to add to that a basic definition that comes from scripture, if I may. I think you'll find it agrees pretty closely with the dictionary. Faith is "the essence of things hoped for but not seen." Now, bearing those two definitions in mind, I'm'a let you in on a little secret about faith.
I once heard from a wise man something I will be paraphrasing, since I didn't have anything to write with when I heard him say it. Anyone who responds to religion or deity with "prove it" fundamentally misunderstands both faith and God.
Let me elaborate. In the Mormon church (of which I am a member) there is a bit of a cultural phenomenon associated with the first Sunday of every month. Instead of a traditional worship service, we have something called a testimony meeting, in which any member of the congregation is welcome to step to the pulpit in the chapel and share their testimony. Essentially a testimony is a statement of belief or faith. Or it's supposed to be. If you've ever been to one of these you know that more often than not it ends up being a recitation of what's going on in people's lives or a rote repetition of the same five phrases over and over again.
But regardless of what actually goes down in the meeting, you will usually hear somebody say something to the effect of "I know (insert doctrinal principle) is true." This is a testimony. A personal affirmation of truth in relation to some aspect of the gospel.
Some of you may see where I'm going already. Because if you look at our definitions of faith up above, you'll see references to belief where there is no proof, and hope in something you cannot see. I think that culturally in the Mormon church we sometimes get caught up in the moment of sharing faith and we forget to acknowledge something. When we say "I know (X) is true" we're not using the same definition of "know" as everyone else.
I'm not actually going to put the definition of know here. Yeah, you all thought you knew what was coming. But I assume that if your reading comprehension levels are high enough that you've kept up with me so far, I don't need to spell this out for you. You know what "know" means. And if you don't know, wether you don't know if you know or... Eesh. Look, knowing something requires some kind of interaction with it. Knowledge outside of the cultural bubble of the Mormon church (and various other religions) requires proof.
So let's just match up terminology here. When a religious person says "I know God is real" they're not saying "I've seen God," what they're saying is "I've had what I have chosen to interpret as spiritual confirmation of the existence of God." It's basically like saying "I really, very strongly, no like incredibly strongly believe that God is real."
Saying "I know" is religious shorthand, is what I'm saying. Keep that in mind for future reference.
And that's where faith comes in. Because you may recall that faith is "belief... based on spiritual (perception) rather than proof." So here's the hard thing about faith. No matter what you do, there is a statistical certainty that you will never actually know, in the literal sense, that those beliefs are true.
I say statistical certainty because there is a precedence of mortals receiving proof positive of the reality of divinity in scripture. Those stories have been recorded. But the number of people that applies to is so minuscule in comparison to the population of the world throughout time that, yeah, it probably won't happen to any of us.
We'll get to why that is in a second, but I want to just point out that this is why religion is hard. Like, just really hard. As humans, we kinda like validation. We're told to do things, we do those things, and if we're validated appropriately, we'll keep doing those things. If we're not validated appropriately, we tend to not want to do those things anymore. That's perfectly normal behavior for, you know, just everyone.
But religion doesn't work like that. We have scripture that says it is the word of God. It says we should test the teachings of scripture by following certain commandments. It says if we follow those commandments, we will receive blessings. But in my experience, every time I follow a commandment, there is never a terribly obvious validation.
Don't get me wrong. I do believe in God, very strongly. And I do believe that I have been blessed for following those commandments. But the blessings I've received could easily be seen as the result of my own efforts or random coincidence. Because that's how faith works.
You have faith that you will receive blessings in response to keeping commandments. You act on that faith by keeping commandments. Stuff happens in your life after you act. At this point you have a choice. You can choose to see that stuff as a product of your efforts or coincidence, or you can choose to see it as a blessing from God. If you chose that second one, then your faith will be strengthened, and you'll likely circle back around to the beginning of the whole process.
And as with anything where faith in God is concerned, you won't come out of it with proof, just a highly personal spiritual affirmation that you will have a remarkably hard time articulating to anyone who hasn't also experienced something similar. And so you'll continue, acting and believing, and yet somehow knowing at the back of your mind the whole time that you will (most likely) never, in this life, literally know whether what you believe is true.
Let me reiterate; people who understand their religion have accepted that they probably will not see proof positive confirmation of their faith until after they have died.
And that is a very strange sort of limbo to be living in, let me tell you. There are a few advantages, such as the fact that humans are creatures of habit, and at least where the teachings of Christ are concerned, acting on faith breeds good habits (and this is a discussion for another time, but I would argue that where Christian's have historically done horrible things in the name of Christianity, it's because they weren't acting on faith). But there's also this constant, nagging concern that you're actually a little insane. It makes it difficult to keep choosing faith over "eh, heck with it" every time. But the whole thing is set up like this for a reason, and now we'll talk about why!
At first glance you're probably thinking it sounds an awful lot like things got set up this way because God is a jerk. But I swear that's not the case. I have done a lot of research concerning this across a dozen major US religions (which includes Buddhism and Islam, because yay America!), and after it all the explanation that rings most true with me is that offered by the Mormon church. It's why I'm still a member of it, once all is said and done.
In summary, the reason that we have to live based on faith where God is concerned is that he loves each of us, he has a plan for each of us, and in order for that plan to work, we cannot know he's really there.
I recognize that sounds like a bad plan. And to some of you it probably still sounds like God is a jerk. But let's start with a few foundational principles concerning God and talk through it, and see how you feel when we're done.
First principle: God is literally the father of our spirits. In the Mormon church, we teach our children to recognize Him as Heavenly Father before they recognize Him as deity. Because for anything that comes after to make sense, we must understand that there's a perfect paternal relationship involved here. We are not just creations, we are literal children.
Second principle: God wants what is best for us. Think of your own kids or go check with your friends who have kids. Any parent who understands their role as a parent in even the slightest sense wants what is best for their children. Offspring just kinda do that to you. I'd imagine the trait is evolutionarily selected for in pretty much any species that reproduces sexually. So assuming a perfect parental relationship with God, it follows that He would want what's best for us.
Now hold that up against parents you know again. I think we can probably all agree that sometimes what a parent knows is best for their child does not line up with what the child thinks is best for themselves. Might go a ways toward explaining why God sometimes seems like a jerk?
Third principle: God has made a plan for us to, eventually, become what He knows is best for us. In the Mormon faith we call this the Plan of Salvation, and scriptural writings sum it up quite nicely by simply saying that we can eventually have "all that the Father hath." That can sound weird, I know, but again, think of it in the context of that perfect paternal relationship. What father wouldn't want his children to have at least everything that they have?
Now, I'm not going to walk through the entire Plan of Salvation, because hey! This is already long. But what you need to know in the context of a conversation about faith is that the part of the plan we're dealing with right now, formally known as uh, Earth life, is intended as a sort of test. A proving ground where we can grow, improve ourselves, and ultimately demonstrate that we have the self-control and capacity to eventually receive "all that the Father hath."
But in order for it to be a true test, especially of our self-control, we have to take the test closed-book, running on faith as opposed to knowledge. To that end, this Earth life is bracketed by a couple of veils intended to separate us from anything we knew about God and His plan before we were born. Why, you may ask, do we have to go into this blind? I'll tell you!
I dunno.
Sorry. But we're all in this amnesiac boat together. Though technically we're not totally blind. Like I said earlier, I believe that I have received confirmations of my faith many, many times. While they may be difficult to recognize, and they certainly don't constitute proof, they have been there, and I believe anyone can receive and recognize those confirmations. Also, we have the testimonies of other people, and especially the testimonies in the scriptures of some of the very small number of people who did actually receive a personal proof. This stuff is our reference material for this test of life.
And sure, sometimes that can seem like pretty lousy reference material. But what we have thus far is the understanding that God set up this plan like this for a reason, and He wants what is best for us. Just because we don't (or can't) understand the reason doesn't mean it isn't there. As I said earlier, children often don't understand why their parents ask them to do what they ask them to do. For us, here on this Earth, we have to operate on faith.
So yeah, faith is hard. It's hard to have it, harder to act on it, and even harder to realize that all you'll probably ever get in response are these little flashes of something that could be vastly profound, though you're not absolutely sure. You'll hold yourself to a higher standard all on the faith that when you're done here, there will be something much better waiting for you on the other side.
Some people think that sounds helplessly naive, and no, I can't prove to you that I'm right. Pointing out that I can't prove it will accomplish nothing, though, because I'm not actually naive. I accepted this arrangement a long time ago. If nothing else I hope you understand why proof has nothing at all to do with faith. Why asking for proof will do nothing to inform your understanding of religion or faith, while also doing nothing to convince the faithful of, well, anything.
Fundamentally, where faith is concerned, proof is impossible. After we die it will have been worth it or we'll all vanish utterly. That is the only proof you're going to get. So don't ask for poof, I won't give it to you.
That's commandment number six, after all.
So that title up there can and does mean probably a hundred different things to a hundred different people.
 |
| This is what it means to... somebody, I guess. Thanks, Google! |
And that's hardly a great place to start a conversation from, but hey, here I am. Starting it anyway. To that end, I'd like to slap some definitions in place. You frequenters (yes, that's your name now) may recognize this as being one of the things I do under the "etc" portion of the list above, but I promise it's not the meat of what I'm going after here. More like the... fur. Or something.
New Oxford American: Faith - 1) complete trust of or confidence in someone or something. 2) strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof.
I'd like to point out that "apprehension" as used in the second definition dates from the early 14th century meaning "perception or comprehension" instead of the "dreadful anticipation" definition you're probably all familiar with. That dates from the early 17th century. And yes, I did get some etymology into this post, of course I did. That's always an option. All blog posts have words.
Now you've probably guessed, considering there's nothing particularly interesting in the etymological evolution of a word that has remained fundamentally unchanged since its origins in Latin (seriously, how dull), that I'm here today focused on that second definition. I'd like to add to that a basic definition that comes from scripture, if I may. I think you'll find it agrees pretty closely with the dictionary. Faith is "the essence of things hoped for but not seen." Now, bearing those two definitions in mind, I'm'a let you in on a little secret about faith.
I once heard from a wise man something I will be paraphrasing, since I didn't have anything to write with when I heard him say it. Anyone who responds to religion or deity with "prove it" fundamentally misunderstands both faith and God.
Let me elaborate. In the Mormon church (of which I am a member) there is a bit of a cultural phenomenon associated with the first Sunday of every month. Instead of a traditional worship service, we have something called a testimony meeting, in which any member of the congregation is welcome to step to the pulpit in the chapel and share their testimony. Essentially a testimony is a statement of belief or faith. Or it's supposed to be. If you've ever been to one of these you know that more often than not it ends up being a recitation of what's going on in people's lives or a rote repetition of the same five phrases over and over again.
But regardless of what actually goes down in the meeting, you will usually hear somebody say something to the effect of "I know (insert doctrinal principle) is true." This is a testimony. A personal affirmation of truth in relation to some aspect of the gospel.
Some of you may see where I'm going already. Because if you look at our definitions of faith up above, you'll see references to belief where there is no proof, and hope in something you cannot see. I think that culturally in the Mormon church we sometimes get caught up in the moment of sharing faith and we forget to acknowledge something. When we say "I know (X) is true" we're not using the same definition of "know" as everyone else.
I'm not actually going to put the definition of know here. Yeah, you all thought you knew what was coming. But I assume that if your reading comprehension levels are high enough that you've kept up with me so far, I don't need to spell this out for you. You know what "know" means. And if you don't know, wether you don't know if you know or... Eesh. Look, knowing something requires some kind of interaction with it. Knowledge outside of the cultural bubble of the Mormon church (and various other religions) requires proof.
So let's just match up terminology here. When a religious person says "I know God is real" they're not saying "I've seen God," what they're saying is "I've had what I have chosen to interpret as spiritual confirmation of the existence of God." It's basically like saying "I really, very strongly, no like incredibly strongly believe that God is real."
Saying "I know" is religious shorthand, is what I'm saying. Keep that in mind for future reference.
And that's where faith comes in. Because you may recall that faith is "belief... based on spiritual (perception) rather than proof." So here's the hard thing about faith. No matter what you do, there is a statistical certainty that you will never actually know, in the literal sense, that those beliefs are true.
I say statistical certainty because there is a precedence of mortals receiving proof positive of the reality of divinity in scripture. Those stories have been recorded. But the number of people that applies to is so minuscule in comparison to the population of the world throughout time that, yeah, it probably won't happen to any of us.
We'll get to why that is in a second, but I want to just point out that this is why religion is hard. Like, just really hard. As humans, we kinda like validation. We're told to do things, we do those things, and if we're validated appropriately, we'll keep doing those things. If we're not validated appropriately, we tend to not want to do those things anymore. That's perfectly normal behavior for, you know, just everyone.
But religion doesn't work like that. We have scripture that says it is the word of God. It says we should test the teachings of scripture by following certain commandments. It says if we follow those commandments, we will receive blessings. But in my experience, every time I follow a commandment, there is never a terribly obvious validation.
Don't get me wrong. I do believe in God, very strongly. And I do believe that I have been blessed for following those commandments. But the blessings I've received could easily be seen as the result of my own efforts or random coincidence. Because that's how faith works.
You have faith that you will receive blessings in response to keeping commandments. You act on that faith by keeping commandments. Stuff happens in your life after you act. At this point you have a choice. You can choose to see that stuff as a product of your efforts or coincidence, or you can choose to see it as a blessing from God. If you chose that second one, then your faith will be strengthened, and you'll likely circle back around to the beginning of the whole process.
And as with anything where faith in God is concerned, you won't come out of it with proof, just a highly personal spiritual affirmation that you will have a remarkably hard time articulating to anyone who hasn't also experienced something similar. And so you'll continue, acting and believing, and yet somehow knowing at the back of your mind the whole time that you will (most likely) never, in this life, literally know whether what you believe is true.
Let me reiterate; people who understand their religion have accepted that they probably will not see proof positive confirmation of their faith until after they have died.
And that is a very strange sort of limbo to be living in, let me tell you. There are a few advantages, such as the fact that humans are creatures of habit, and at least where the teachings of Christ are concerned, acting on faith breeds good habits (and this is a discussion for another time, but I would argue that where Christian's have historically done horrible things in the name of Christianity, it's because they weren't acting on faith). But there's also this constant, nagging concern that you're actually a little insane. It makes it difficult to keep choosing faith over "eh, heck with it" every time. But the whole thing is set up like this for a reason, and now we'll talk about why!
At first glance you're probably thinking it sounds an awful lot like things got set up this way because God is a jerk. But I swear that's not the case. I have done a lot of research concerning this across a dozen major US religions (which includes Buddhism and Islam, because yay America!), and after it all the explanation that rings most true with me is that offered by the Mormon church. It's why I'm still a member of it, once all is said and done.
In summary, the reason that we have to live based on faith where God is concerned is that he loves each of us, he has a plan for each of us, and in order for that plan to work, we cannot know he's really there.
I recognize that sounds like a bad plan. And to some of you it probably still sounds like God is a jerk. But let's start with a few foundational principles concerning God and talk through it, and see how you feel when we're done.
First principle: God is literally the father of our spirits. In the Mormon church, we teach our children to recognize Him as Heavenly Father before they recognize Him as deity. Because for anything that comes after to make sense, we must understand that there's a perfect paternal relationship involved here. We are not just creations, we are literal children.
Second principle: God wants what is best for us. Think of your own kids or go check with your friends who have kids. Any parent who understands their role as a parent in even the slightest sense wants what is best for their children. Offspring just kinda do that to you. I'd imagine the trait is evolutionarily selected for in pretty much any species that reproduces sexually. So assuming a perfect parental relationship with God, it follows that He would want what's best for us.
Now hold that up against parents you know again. I think we can probably all agree that sometimes what a parent knows is best for their child does not line up with what the child thinks is best for themselves. Might go a ways toward explaining why God sometimes seems like a jerk?
Third principle: God has made a plan for us to, eventually, become what He knows is best for us. In the Mormon faith we call this the Plan of Salvation, and scriptural writings sum it up quite nicely by simply saying that we can eventually have "all that the Father hath." That can sound weird, I know, but again, think of it in the context of that perfect paternal relationship. What father wouldn't want his children to have at least everything that they have?
Now, I'm not going to walk through the entire Plan of Salvation, because hey! This is already long. But what you need to know in the context of a conversation about faith is that the part of the plan we're dealing with right now, formally known as uh, Earth life, is intended as a sort of test. A proving ground where we can grow, improve ourselves, and ultimately demonstrate that we have the self-control and capacity to eventually receive "all that the Father hath."
But in order for it to be a true test, especially of our self-control, we have to take the test closed-book, running on faith as opposed to knowledge. To that end, this Earth life is bracketed by a couple of veils intended to separate us from anything we knew about God and His plan before we were born. Why, you may ask, do we have to go into this blind? I'll tell you!
I dunno.
Sorry. But we're all in this amnesiac boat together. Though technically we're not totally blind. Like I said earlier, I believe that I have received confirmations of my faith many, many times. While they may be difficult to recognize, and they certainly don't constitute proof, they have been there, and I believe anyone can receive and recognize those confirmations. Also, we have the testimonies of other people, and especially the testimonies in the scriptures of some of the very small number of people who did actually receive a personal proof. This stuff is our reference material for this test of life.
And sure, sometimes that can seem like pretty lousy reference material. But what we have thus far is the understanding that God set up this plan like this for a reason, and He wants what is best for us. Just because we don't (or can't) understand the reason doesn't mean it isn't there. As I said earlier, children often don't understand why their parents ask them to do what they ask them to do. For us, here on this Earth, we have to operate on faith.
So yeah, faith is hard. It's hard to have it, harder to act on it, and even harder to realize that all you'll probably ever get in response are these little flashes of something that could be vastly profound, though you're not absolutely sure. You'll hold yourself to a higher standard all on the faith that when you're done here, there will be something much better waiting for you on the other side.
Some people think that sounds helplessly naive, and no, I can't prove to you that I'm right. Pointing out that I can't prove it will accomplish nothing, though, because I'm not actually naive. I accepted this arrangement a long time ago. If nothing else I hope you understand why proof has nothing at all to do with faith. Why asking for proof will do nothing to inform your understanding of religion or faith, while also doing nothing to convince the faithful of, well, anything.
Fundamentally, where faith is concerned, proof is impossible. After we die it will have been worth it or we'll all vanish utterly. That is the only proof you're going to get. So don't ask for poof, I won't give it to you.
That's commandment number six, after all.
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