Coyote's Den

Aug 4, 2004 (later edited on September 3, 2005)

One of the things that gets to me, that I think is something of a double standard is this:

And this is not just Christians who do this... I see pagans do it too... all the time!

A person will present to me a belief that they use as a foundation for their system of beliefs.

I will say that I don't personally share that belief.

They will then attempt to prove the belief is true, by appealing to a book or authority. For Christians, this is generally the bible, and with pagans or metaphysical types, it'll be either a pagan authority figure (Gardner, Buckland, or often someone not so legitimate) or perhaps some pseudo-sciencey thing that babbles about quantum physics (which they'll use to "prove" something like the existence of ghosts or magick).

Now... my response to the bible argument is usually something on the order of "I can't use a book as proof just because the book says to believe the book." Anyone who can't understand why that is a circular argument is probably not able to be reasoned with.

With the pagan types who try to prove that, for instance, Wicca is a thousands-of-years-old religion that survived in an unbroken line underground and has re-established itself, I'll explain that it appears this isn't true and that it seems clear that a few recent historical figures just made that up to make it seem to have more authority.

When it's a tin-foil-hat theory from a metaphysical person, I'll attempt to point out the flaws or inconsistencies in the pseudoscience, or point out places where the stuff they use as "evidence" is really stuff that could be interpreted very differently and doesn't justify a particular belief. I've seen a lot of people who don't really understand science or technology, who, through their misunderstanding of the subject, will draw a lot of faulty conclusions.

And then - and here's the good part - in response to any logical arguments, the person generally falls back on an argument like "Some things aren't a matter of proof, but of faith", or "Sometimes you have to go with your heart, and not your head."

Which is a fine argument, and one I can respect.

But when I say "Well, my heart tells me the thing you are talking about isn't true for me", they return to the "authority" or "proof".

If it's a matter of faith, that's fine. I'm cool with that. But I believe that the other person should respect my decision on where I put my faith.

If it's something that's a matter of proof... don't mix it with faith. Use the proof. If the proof isn't good enough, then it's not good enough.

Often, what I actually see is people attempting to prove their beliefs are true to other people... and they become fearful and insecure if they cannot do so. While a great deal of lip-service is made to faith, it seems apparent that what they really want is proof, and the only "faith" I see comes from ignoring holes in their proof. To me, that's not faith, that's merely self-delusion.

To me, the core message of Christianity is not "The bible is true, now worship Jehovah or else". It's "Here's how Christ acted, and how he said others ought to act." It wasn't about it being the law so much as about right action and how to treat others and govern yourself.

In other words, within that message, regardless of the amount of literal truth or representation of the events, regardless of what can be proved, the message is "You should be good to others and carry a message of love in your heart, and trust that the Creator is good and loving." This, taken on faith, regardless of proof, is a perfectly valid message. You don't need to prove to another person that God came down and wrote such and so passage, or that Jesus actually said this or that, or that nobody lied or re-wrote, or mistranslated anything.

And you don't need to blind yourself to the fact that there are other parts of the Bible that say certain things are right, that most people nowadays feel to be wrong. It's not generally considered "okay" to own slaves, much less beat them. It's not usually considered okay to kill your children if they do wrong. Nice gods don't feed kids to bears just because they made fun of a bald guy. Most people nowadays don't believe that men are inherently smarter and more important than women.

For Wicca to be a valid religion likewise does not require proof that it existed in unbroken form for thousands of years. To begin with... it didn't. The beliefs and fundamentals and faith of it do not require that Gerald Gardner not have made up a religion. The tenets that good becomes more good, and bad becomes more bad, of personal responsibility for one's actions, and of recognizing the connection to the earth and to other spirits does not require that "Gospel of the Witches" not have been made up in the last century. Even if Gardner and others did make it all up or fib about what they borrowed or recreated, that doesn't mean the faith itself is invalid.

The metaphysical person who wants to believe in life after death or "energy work" does not need to prove that quantum particles and energy generators use blah blah scientific theory. Generally, that's hokum. What they're attempting to do, pretty much, is use pseudoscience to justify the faith in something that they already have.

And when you need to justify something, that usually tells me that some part of you doesn't really believe in it. When you are afraid to think about something, or apply reason to it, that tells me that some part of you really doesn't have faith in it.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, if you need proof for your faith, let it be good proof. If you don't need proof for your faith, don't try to predicate your faith on proof.

I think what happens when people proselytize or try to infect others with their personal memes is that they know the other person doesn't share their faith, so they try to convert them with proof. The problem is, when the proof is bad, then people are following something based on a bad decision, a decision involving neither faith nor logic, neither intuition nor intellect. It becomes an empty belief system for the other people.

And when that happens, even if the message were good, people aren't truly absorbing it. They're only absorbing the justifications or the fabrications. And that puts them at a remove from true understanding or true faith.

You can use anything you want as an excuse to believe something. You can use faith, or science. You can use bad science if you want. You can just pull it outta your butt if you want.

But when attempting to get others to believe something, I think it becomes of dire importance to not only make sure that what you are trying to feed them is good - in other words, has value beyond the value to yourself, but also that if you are founding your beliefs on faith, especially, that you must respect their desire to find their faith in another way or not at all.

When you trust in faith, and when you believe that faith is the most important reason to believe something, how can you put less trust in the faith of others? If it is that meaningful to you, how can you deny another their own faith?

- If you have to trick someone into believing
- if you have to use excuses, or misdirection, or rhetorical arguments or other tricks
- if you have to fool someone into believing something
- if you have to try and rewrite science or history
- if you truly feel you need to hide from truth in any way, or hide the truth from another in any way, in order for them to adopt your belief system
- If your own beliefs can only survive if you put blinders on

..then I would suggest that your own beliefs may be suspect. And that what you are trying to pass on may not be good.

If you have to blind yourself in order to keep your "faith", then it's not really faith. Faith comes after you know all you can. Faith comes from an educated decision, it is a deliberate decision.

I read a quote from someone in the Letters column of the September 5, 2005* issue of TIME magazine, by a lady named Beverly Friedenberg, that I think sums it up best:

"No person of faith should be threatened by science, nor should science be subverted to serve one particular religious belief"

When I was shown the difference between faith and certainty, I feared that this would make me feel faith even less. After all, if I knew what was true, beyond a shadow of a doubt, where was there room for faith?

I can ask people to take this on faith: faith is not about certainty. It's about trust. It's not about knowing or proving the answer, it's about choosing what you believe that answer must be.

To me, faith is not the same as belief. Faith is when you say "I choose to trust that this must be true."

You have a belief. You choose to have faith.

Faith is when you decide "This is how the universe is. This is the I know things must be. This is what I choose to hold true to and believe in."

You can use science, or you can use intuition, or you can pull the reason for your faith outta your butt. Even a scientist must have faith that their tools or methods are valid, or that what their universe seems to be is what it truly is.

When I have faith in my fellow man, it is not because I have evidence. It is because I have taken all that I have seen in people, and all that I feel about people, and have chosen to believe that there is something worthwhile in the human race. I don't know if there is. I don't know if we will make it. I choose to have faith that we'll make it. I choose to have faith that the best parts of us will win out over the worst.

I don't know if there is a Creator. I choose to have faith that there is. I choose to believe that my experiences and memories and feelings in that regard are true. And I choose to believe - in other words, I have faith that - Creator made the universe as an act of love. As an act of wishing to be. Not to toy with us, and not so that there would be something to offer worship, but for the sake of there being a Universe. I have faith that we are all part of that great creation, and that however things turn out, that it all matters.

That is what I choose to believe. That is what I hold to. That is what I put my faith in.

In light of that, it does not matter that I have doubts. It does not matter that I lack evidence I could show to another, or even to myself.

I choose that it is so. I have faith that it is so.