Why Belief?

Quite apart from the promises of a particular faith, believers have a number of advantages.  On the social level, there is a sense of community, common purpose and shared resources that can make a real difference – in everything from a natural pool of deep relationships based on shared values and goals to commercial and political contacts.

Then there are various models of social activism (conservative and liberal, revolutionary and reactionary) that help us understand and interact with our community, nation and world in new and different ways.  Belief provides the foundation for task groups that work to change the surrounding culture according to the model of relity put forward by a belief system.

Then there are advantages that stem from self-examination and self-knowledge.  Through faith, you share in a consensual model of reality that is re-enforced and expanded upon by your peer group.  You have access to mentorship and modeling.  You have guides (both historical and contemporary) to inner disciplines and ways of thinking that expand your ways of interating the world.  You have opportunities to apply these ways of thinking about yourself and others both to inner growth and in how you relate to family, friends and community.

When you feel stuck or alienated, you have a rich history of other’s attempts to address similar problems and issues – both explanations of the root cause, and testimonies of what has worked to address these problems for others.

Along with this model of reality, you have ethics and morals, expectations and strictures – things that you should and should not do that are rooted in a shared belief system.  You have lots of models of how those behaviuors have worked for others – many, perhaos, similar to you.

Perhaps most crucially, you have extraordinary efforts made by people who are strongly committed to your belief.  As a result of their commitment, they make extreme sacrifices (of their time, resources, mental and physical energies) to create structures and support systems for the belief – which then become available to all believers.

Then there are the encouragements to seek out patterns – both in our inner, intuitive processes and in the world around us.  Events, encournters, impressions — the most mundane occurrences can be embued with a sense of meaning and purpose.  There can be a rich sense of synchoncity and significance to life.

All of these advantages come from belief.  This all in addition to a mental map of the world that has been annotated and expanded by a large number of people, the positive affirmation that comes from shared belief, and the optimism and hope engendered by feeling part of something larger than yourself.

Downsides?  Belief systems tend to also form control structures, out groups, become dogmatic – and perhaps most importantly are often founded on assumptions about the world that are simply inaccurate.  Critical thought, as a result, can be discouraged (at least outside the bounds of the belief structure).  Many belief systems are based on wildly inaccurate understandings of people and the natural world, and so require dealing with a fair amount of cognative disonance, and encourage making decisions that are at odds with reality.

As well, life has a way of defying attempts to make sense of everything.  Patterns fail to materialisze, explanations don’t satisfy, people fail to live up to their promises and obligations, and the world seems to run on a different set of principles and priorties (or perhaps seems to simply defy easy understanding), causing us to constantly rationalize our experiences to match our belief – or risk our belief being transformed – or simply lost.

For most folks, it seems, this is a wothwhile trade-off.  In return for conformity and obedience, you get grounds for optimism, a shared model of how the world works and a community of people who will have given at least some level of consent to a set of beliefs and practices that you can to some degree count on.

So give up belief just because it is too simple or based on false assumptions?Live in isolation and scepticism?  Suspend critical thought and choose to have faith?  Or work to find a model of the world that both minimizes congantive dissonance and provides a foundation for community, self-examination and a postive, integrated engagement with the broader culture and natural world around us?

I want to be a part of a community of believers – one where people choose to share a set of morals and ethics, a model of how the world works, and who recongize the shared obligations and advantages that come from being  interconnected.  I just don’t want to believe in things that are not true in order to get there.

 

Between a barbarian and a taliban

Over 25 % of men in a recent South African survey admitted to rape.  The article quotes a government official as saying that this behavior is so ingrained in the culture that it isn’t a law enforcement issue, it is a deep-seated cultural issue.  At issue is what it means to be a man – and, without putting too fine a point on it, a human being.  So this is barbarism.

In the Swat Valley, villagers have taken up arms against religious thugs who think that throwing acid in the faces of school children, and stoning girls for unspecified offences is the way to honor god.  We’ve got to find a way between these two extremes.

We’ve got to find a way to have discussions about deep-seated differences without resorting to violence.  Can you be vocal about a pro-abortion stance without risking murder?  Can you be gay without risking being mugged?  If our history has shown us anything, it is that we cannot know the truth (though thinking we know is something else again).  Given that, we need to admit a certain amount of tolerance, a certain amount of latitude – until we can no longer put up with it.  Then we need a set of laws to sanction the behaviour, and if required, to protect us from evil.

Open the gate too wide, and we are awash in aberrant behaviours that are not good for civil society.  Too narrow, and we demonize anyone who thinks or acts differently than we do.  And in any event, laws enforce norms – what we need is to adopt and promulgate a series of norms that strike the right balance.  To do this, we need a comprehensive education aimed at more than getting a job, a democracy encompassing engaged, informed citizens, sensible curbs on the power of money to buy votes and a functioning balance of power.

We need a nation of people convinced of the necessity of civil liberties, of economic justice, of common courtesy and respect.  We need to throw off the attempts of corporations to drive the culture into shallow consumerism and voyeurism – we need an American dream, a global dream that is attainable, affordable, sustainable and ultimately satisfying.  We do that by seeking, and finding, this for ourselves and our community – and then from that base, reaching out to the world around us, and working to provide that same opportunity for everyone – even people who have a different dream in mind.  Not any dream – there are limits, as we are learning as we watch the men of South Africa or the Taliban of Swat valley pursue theirs.  Not any dream, as we watch corporations horde more and more of the world’s wealth, and squander more and more of our dwindling resources.  Not any dream, as we watch our culture descend into narcissism and opportunistic materialism, valuing neither themselves nor the people around them.

The answer cannot be to descend into religous fundamentalism – exchanging chaotic horror for relgiously-sanctioned horror.  We’ve got to open our eyes to the fact that only as each one of us behaves less selfishly, as each of us promotes peace, and practices tolerance and mercy can we build a better society.  We can begin to change the game by ourselves playing  by different rules, and by working to ensure that the rules apply to everyone.  The alternative is chaos.