I Have Returned

It's been over six months since I posted my last blog. It's not that I haven't had anything to say during that time. I think the reasons for not writing have been first, I'm fairly certain no one is reading any of this and second, perhaps a bit of self-effacement. I haven't really felt worthy to be pontificating about my spiritual journey when, to be honest, I haven't been feeling all that spiritual.

I suppose I've been going through a period of questioning. Questioning matters of faith, questioning what I want out of life, and questioning what, at this stage of the game, I can really expect to receive.

I've heard the comparison made that faith is like an onion. An in-tact onion has its own nature, character, and definition. But when you peel back the layers, what you end up with are a bunch of stinking strips. You may still have something onion-like, but the essence (the such-ness) of the onion is ruined. Or a motor. The in-tact motor has purpose, but if you dismantle it, you end up with only a bunch of parts.

Faith is like that. When you believe with humility, it gives you meaning and purpose. But when you start questioning and picking everything apart, or when you choose "a la carte" what you want to believe or, most dangerously of all, begin basing your beliefs on what others do or think, then you end up with a bunch of parts that don't make sense.

It goes back to what I earlier wrote about chaos. That blog entry was also written after a period of questioning. That had more to do with questioning why there was pain in the world. This latest episode has to do with understanding what it is I really believe and how I should then live.

And so here I am almost a year later arriving at the same conclusions. You must live your faith with abandon. You must defer to the teachings of the faith. It's not always easy. But in living life consistently with what you believe, there is peace and freedom. In trying to have it all on your own terms, there is confusion and despair.

It is in dying that we are born to eternal life.