go ahead, be uncomfortable:

religion.

i've been raised on it since i was born. christian doctrines placed on my forehead in the form of baptismal water when i was three. grown in the same church from age four, something to lean on when i was physically, literally, struggling to grow through my adolescence. always a buffer zone, a bomb shelter. concrete walls--metaphorical. the stained glass, i'm afraid, won't do much to protect us from nuclear armageddon.

lately, obviously, it's falling away. the more time i spend thinking about it, the less i keep going (and sometimes, a six-hour shift at work is thrown in for free--eight-fifty-five an hour, kids, fer countin' change). without religion, the shelter's gotten cracks in the walls, and they've tumbled down like Jericho (oddly enough). i climb up through the dirt and the roots and find myself on the surface. nothing to hold me back--nothing to fall back to, keep me safe.

i just came across an article explaining unitarianism and universalism and such, and wondered if that would be for me. it almost seemed so--humanism, striving for justice and compassion, acceptance--but for a few things.

first: denouncing the existence of the Trinity. despite my wavering convictions about the organized religion aspect of the christian church, i believe in the Trinity. i believe there is a God. i believe in Jesus as a moral depiction, and as the Son of God, which would make him a deity, and i believe there is some sort of holy spirit whose presence i can feel, sometimes, when i've witnessed the most outrageous event, or when i'm alone in the quiet and still. this excludes me from the unitarian structure.

second: that all souls will be saved. it would be nice, and i'd like to think, hope, that there is good in humanity. but believing in God means i believe that Satan exists, whether just as God's enemy or a fallen angel, and when the weak characters of men cause them to fall into such a disgusting path--call me stubborn, but there are honestly some souls who, i feel, deserve to be punished. to be fair, everyone should be given a chance to turn around and do things for the good of their fellow man, their god, and their own souls, and wouldn't that be a bit more along the lines of justice? call me cruel and conservative, but to me, justice does not mean merely handing everyone a rite of passage to paradise. give it a fair trial.

i embrace christian fundamentals, those based on faith. i accept this as a faith and not a religion, a relationship and worship and reverence at the same time. i know this in my heart of hearts.

this seems the most unusual smattering of "personal beliefs" i've ever divulged from the depths. but i don't think there's any way of condensing it when someone asks "well then what the (expletive) do you believe???"

sit your pretty arse down and settle.

faith.

-d