Hall With A View

Reflecting on faith

In listening to an episode of This American Life about one ex-Christian's reflections on his Christian upbringing. The presenter clearly had some difficult experiences within a church community on multiple facets. The episode caused me to think through my own experience with faith.

I didn't totally grow up in a home that practiced faith, meaning that it wasn't until I was in my early teens that my Mom and Step Dad started regularly attending church. This started a chain of events in our family, as while I didn't come to faith until a few years after this, it positioned my family as a Christian family.

As I listened to the presenter lament how the faith damaged his self image or his views on sex, I reflect back on my upbringing with none of those same regrets. I wonder if this is because of when I became involved in church, I accepted the core tenants of the faith without question. I think the statement of core tenants is key here. There are a number of things that exsist on the edges of the faith that Christians have disagreed about for years. Things like the role of women in church leadership (I support the appointment of women as pastors, elders, and all other church leadership positions) or different views of the creation account (while I do believe in a God who does simply create by speaking it into existance, it seems to me that life has been created through an evolutionary process) are not core tenants but issues that need not mark a line in the sand of who is and who is not a Christian.

I have struggled with depression over the years, and yet I don't reflect on this as a product or failure of my faith. Yes, I do believe in sin and the need for Jesus to save us from that sin, I also understand that there chemical imbalances within the brain that can cause depression. There are behaviours I have learned over the years either from my parents, my culture, or just as coping mechanisms that contributed to suffering from depression.

Maybe the difference between myself and the presenter is that I'm willing to live in the grey zones of faith. I understand that not everything is going to fit my perception of what God should do and yet still believe and want to pursue God. Maybe that I have a personality that can handle the grey. Maybe the years have given me perspective that can see the long journey, and have some small sense of the greater things around me and my faith - with a real sense that God is at work not just for my good, but to call all who would listen.

I hope the presenter finds peace in their healing from their upbringing. I actually hope that for us all come to think of it...

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