Culture QotW: Place of Worship

How often do you go to a place of worship? What is it like there?

I don't, and I haven't for quite a long time, excluding weddings. I usually don't go into religious type things here because, like politics, it's another one of those subjects where the chances of anybody actually changing their mind on an issue is pretty much 0%. But…might as well lay this one out. First of all, I have the up most respect for whatever you, the reader, believes in. It's not up to me to decide what's true and what isn't for other people in matters such as this and what matters most is that everyone finds their own truth, the one that they feel is correct, whatever that may be (or may not be).

I was brought up Roman Catholic (or at least going to a Roman Catholic church primarily as the only one I can remember) as I grew older, we eventually stopped going to mass on Sunday, but I can't remember "why" particularly since it was a long time ago. But in any case, we stopped going to church and I never really went back.

Through the years I've flirted with various states of being. Went through a period of atheism during a good portion of High School and then settled on being largely agnostic for a period. Going to take a little side trip here, so bare with me.

Over the years I've largely soured on organized religion. I've seen religion used far too many times to control people or to justify doing things which nobody should be able to justify. Whenever humans get involved and create some sort of an organizational structure, it's very hard for politics and power to not enter the picture. It seems to be human nature.

I want to clarify very quickly and very strongly that I don't believe that religion is inherently evil or that it's the source of all the worlds problems. But I have a hard time looking at situations like the child abuse happening in the roman catholic church and their response to that whole thing, just made me very aware that it seems as if the presence of humans trying to interpret the divine poisoned the process and, as humans tend to do if left alone…totally screwed everything up.

And I'm not just picking on Roman Catholics here either. Any large religion is going to experience this sort of thing, from Islam (Radical Islam anyone?) to the Jews, to all types of Christians, to whatever else is out there. It's human nature, this lust for power and control over others. Even if one has the best intentions, over time power always corrupts, no matter what guise it may be…from trying to protect people from themselves to the personal gain of whoever happens to be in power. Even actions taken with the best intentions can distort.

So, back to my story. I was largely agnostic for a long period of time, until September 11th, 2001. In the days following that (like a lot of people I would imagine), I pretty much reevaluated everything there was to reevaluate. From what the point of existence actually was to if there was a higher power. You know, all the good stuff. I ended up coming to the conclusion that, I was fairly certain there's some sort of higher power or calling out there, but I don't know what sort of form it might take. I don't know who's right and who's wrong as far as which religion to choose for myself, so I'm choosing none.

The best I can do is live my life the best way I know how and to try to treat others in the way I'd like to be treated and help out when I can. I'm fairly certain, as well that organized religion isn't for me because, as I mentioned earlier, once you involve humans, it pollutes the process. And I think it's possible to have faith without religion. Humans just mess everything up.

And there you have it. Probably the first (since I don't remember talking about this before) and last post you'll ever get from me on the subject of religion.

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