My group of friends is a pretty accepting one. And a diverse one - Christians, Jews, Agnostics, Muslims, and people who describe themselves as "spiritual." And no shortage of atheists.
While none of them are malicious, many of my friends think that religion is a crutch. I don't believe they mean this in a bad way - they just haven't fully thought about it. They don't believe in God or they don't believe Jesus is the savior, but they're okay with people who are religious because "anything that gets you through the day is good."
Religion, many people think, is a way to cope with the struggles of life... and nothing more. This is interesting to me, because while I see and understand the good and the grace of God and all that wonderful stuff, more often than not, religion itself isn't getting me through the day. In fact, it's usually what keeps me up at night. It's often challenging and frustrating and nine times out of ten, it makes me question basically everything. It makes me crazy.
I don't know if this is a self-pity thing or a blame game thing, but I can't count the amount of times I've wondered why I "got stuck" with the life I did. And for people who believe in God, this often means asking something along the lines of, "If God is good, why would he let this happen to me?" Sure, I tell myself that God has His own plans and I just don't understand them yet, but if I'm being honest, usually I'm a skeptic and I get caught up in doubt more often than I should and I sit and wonder why the things that happen do. I think about how different my life could have been if I was born into different circumstances and question whether or not God knew what He was doing (or if he really cared at all). Trying to figure out why bad things keep happening, or why bad things have happened, is anything but comforting. My religion calls me to look at my struggling and see how I can make good of it. My childhood had a solid amount of different kinds of abuse, and like most people who experience that, it affects me today. Looking at it generally just makes me mad (justifiably so, I think) and upset. Asking myself to try to see a plan in all of that? Or to see the good that came from it? That is a very difficult thing to do. So when people say, "religion is a crutch. It keeps people comfortable," I don't get mad, but I do wonder if they've ever really thought about religion and what people of faith are called to do. Trying to find the good, the divine, in such horrible memories is not comfortable or fun or filled with joy. It's often torturous.
If trying to stay faithful during my own struggles is hard, remaining faithful during other people's struggles is even harder. It's very, very hard to read a story about a family who lost their child or a family separated by war and to not wonder about God's plan. Can we find peace in knowing there IS a plan? Sure. But that doesn't cancel out the fact that we can't comprehend why something is happening. Knowing God is in control is good, but still, knowing we're not in control is hard. It's uncomfortable.
Beyond that, Catholics believe that every person is a miracle from God, each with his or her own gifts, talents, and purpose. That means that I can't just sit on my sofa watching movies all day. I need to challenge myself to find what I'm good at and then find the confidence to go share it with the world. Basically, we should all be figuring out how we, as individuals, can contribute to community efforts. That is hard. That is uncomfortable.
What's worst, for me, is that being Catholic has changed how I look at almost everything. I've always been Catholic, but I only recently got my stuff together, so I pretty much ignored religion for approximately 21 years. So let me just lay out how I used to think.
My values pretty much went something like this:
1. America
2. Family (by that I mean friends)
3. Education
4. Health
5. Others
WHAT. This translated into really bad opinions. I thought illegal immigrants were horrible, I thought that we should always stick up for America, even if we were wrong (which also meant I was pro-bombing whatever it was America wanted to bomb on any given day). I was as pro-free market as a 16 year old could be (textbooks teach that capitalism is good, everything else is bad). My values were a hot mess. Starting to explore the Church's teachings threw everything I thought I knew out of the window.
How could I continue to think that illegal immigrants were bad? I couldn't. God doesn't love Americans more than He loves other people. All of us are brothers and sisters, yes? So then I really can't think that Americans are more important than anyone else. While I can love America because it's my home, I also needed to start thinking more broadly. Suddenly, I realized that before being an American, I'm a human and a global citizen.
Guys, this just makes things harder. It means acknowledging the fact that America isn't what you thought it was. It means questioning your entire history and changing the way you think about current events. Basically, it hits you that you need to care about and honor everyone. (Which is why, by the way, capitalism isn't okay. When competition and low prices means a person in China is working for a dollar a day, it's unacceptable.)
Aside from the added stress that comes (and pain and solidarity and collective grief) when you identify as a citizen of the world, you're also challenged. God says love thy neighbor. Surely love means "fight with" when your neighbor is being oppressed. It means take a little less if your neighbor needs more. And so Catholicism is a constant call to action and sacrifice. And that's not always comforting.
Just to make it clear that I don't think my religion is some huge burden - I do believe that it is inherently good. God is good, the Church is good. And it's filled with joy. Happily, these struggles go both ways - yes, I'm called to help my neighbor, but he is called to help me, too. I know that when I'm struggling along side someone, I need them just a much as they need me. And the questioning, the doubting? It results in good. I'm glad my mind has been changed. I've noticed that I've started to love people more. I mean people as in humanity - I still take forever to be comfortable with people on a personal level because... issues. But I like people in general. That wasn't something I could say a few years ago. A screaming baby would have annoyed me. An old person driving really slow down a one lane road would have made me crazy. That's just not usually the case for me anymore. But it wasn't easy or comfortable getting to this point (nor is it easy maintaining it...). Peace and joy are good things, but the journey to reach them is arduous and filled with doubt and disappointment and fear and anger. People say that religion exists only to help folks cope with their circumstances, but I don't think that's true. Catholicism doesn't tell me to accept the world for what it is. It tells me to accept that the world and everything in it is God's creation and that I need to do whatever I can to make it better, to alleviate unnecessary suffering. I think that's more of a challenge than a crutch.
And then there's the argument that religion is just a way for people to deal with grief. Yes, being surrounded by people who share your suffering and offer prayers is wonderful. Yes, knowing that there is a communion of saints praying with you in times of need is comforting. And understanding that you're going to be okay because you're in God's hands brings peace. These things all bring warm, fuzzy feelings, right? But that warmth, I think, stems from knowing that God is there and that He has a plan. But not being able to see Him, standing in total faith, not yet understanding His plan is daunting; it's not terrible, but it's terribly large. It's beyond anything any of us can fully comprehend.
I don't think there is anything less comfortable, less convenient, less crutch-like in the world.
_
Charlotte
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