Addendum

This entry was inspired by and is a response to a comment Andrew left on my most recent entry. I originally wrote it as a reply to the comment, but I decided to turn it into its own entry, because it interests me deeply and I feel the matter deserves more discourse than a simple reply on a thread can give it and thought I'd might as well open it up to discussion to everybody else on here as well.

Previously I had mentioned that when I attended Sunday service I felt like an outsider looking in on the whole operation. This, I realise now, deserves some explaining. Maybe this would change if I was more of an active participant in this community and then I would not feel so removed from the action, as it were. But it's not as simple as all that.

My problem is I feel like an outsider because I am not going there for the same reason everybody else is. I feel like an outsider because I can't believe in a lot of what Christians in our day believe. I can't bring myself to say the Apostle's Creed, the very thing that defines Western Christian orthodoxy. It's a silly little thing to fuss over, and it's an awful thing for people to kill for, but personally, if the only reason for this Church is to provide a community, without any sort of spiritual guidance, then I can just as easily find it in other communities, such as theatre. I need a spiritual community. It's not that I want a community that thinks exactly the same thing as I do--I think diversity is a wonderful thing. But I want a community where my beliefs are welcome. And I know that here they're probably not. Thankfully they'll take me in all the same, no questions asked. But I'm not going to sit and listen and go along with something that in some ways don't match up to what I fundamentally believe. For example, I don't believe that Jesus was necessarily the only begotten Son of God, at least not in the sense that the Church teaches it. I'm not even sure what that whole business means. So what am I to do? That's a pretty central Christian belief, isn't it? Do I play along with the liturgy, and quietly pretend that traditional doctrine fits into my worldview quite comfortably, overlooking some obvious differences of opinion?

The way the majority of Christian denominations talk about God, the Bible, and Jesus of Nazareth is so different from my understanding that it's like I'm speaking a different language. Which is unfortunate. Because the language of the Bible is very powerful, moving, and insightful, not to mention a source of inspiration for half of Western culture (you can't go far through the history of music, theatre, art or literature without encountering a Biblical reference). I don't doubt that the words its many authors put down were divinely inspired. But even saying that presents a problem. When I say 'divinely inspired' I don't mean I think that there was some loud booming voice that came down from heaven to dictate God's word verbatim to some poor unsuspecting fellow handpicked to be God's stenographer. Besides, many of the canonical books were not actually written by their supposed authors, but rather transcribed from an oral tradition, which further complicates things (e.g. the Torah was written almost five hundred years after Moses' death). I'm sure the messages they had they felt compelled to write, perhaps because they were in tune with a strong inner voice which others may not have heard. But it's an inner voice we all may have nonetheless, but don't have immediate access to it. (There are geniuses in every field of knowledge we have, from music, to math, to politics, to sports. Why should there not be spiritual geniuses?) The Jews and early Christians had these stories not as facts about the world to be taken literally, but as a way of deeply engaging with the world around and within them, showing that there indeed were individuals among them who were very spiritually attuned. This is what I feel 'divinely inspired' might mean. But the meaning I have for the word 'divine' might be different from the meaning the Church might give it. So do I go to Mass and pretend that we're both talking about the same thing?

Another note: I don't mean to sound like everybody else at this Church, or any Church for that matter, is a simply a group of mindless automatons who all follow along blindly and I'm the only one who is a skeptic. I know that the pews are full of free thinkers, or at least people who have doubts of their own. There is an abundance of life and intelligence and diversity to be found in any congregation. They may not believe in one thing or another, but there is something that nourishes them on a fundamental level that keeps them coming back, and that is fine. I respect that. Why I feel different from them is that I am not being nourished on that level.

As you can see, to me the issue runs deeper than community. It's not that I didn't feel welcome--I did, which was great. But knowing what I know and believing what I believe based on what I know, I didn't feel like I was able to commit to this particular community.