"Dear God. You better make all the bad things go away or you won't get elected next time."
Today marks the end of the Muslim fasting period: Ramadaan and the third day of Rosh Hashanah. Going through Facebook and Twitter, I can't help but notice all the "Eid Mubarak" and "Shana Tova" messages flying around and once again I find myself questioning my faith, or lack thereof.
Anybody who knows me knows that I am completely anti religion, and coming from a Muslim father and a Jehovah's Witness mother, people are either baffled by my stance or completely understanding. Here's my take on religion and why I choose not to subscribe.
When my parents got married, they decided if they had sons they'd be raised Muslim and if they had daughters they'd be raised Christian. They were blessed with me...oh, and my sister. When I was younger, my mom took me to Meetings (church services) at the Jehovah's Witness Kingdom Hall. I don't know if she took me out of habit, or because she specifically wanted to me to have some sort of religious knowledge and/or relationship with God. At first I hated going because the Meetings felt unbearably long (I had and still have the attention span of a hyperactive goldfish) and I knew there was something, ANYTHING, I'd rather be doing, like getting a hiding. Also, the religion, like most I suppose, just took up too much of life: Tuesday book study, Thursday Bible study, Friday and Saturday field service and Sunday Meeting. Seriously? When do I play?
As I got older, my hatred increased because I was old enough to understand that I didn't agree with a lot of what was being said: You can't celebrate birthdays, but you can celebrate wedding anniversaries. No Easter. No Christmas. Women can't wear pants or skirts above the knee. If you're homosexual you are immediately disfellowshipped. Et cetera. Et cetera. So many rules and restrictions didn't make sense to me because surely all that mattered was having faith and a relationship with God and since God was so loving, patient and understanding, why did any of this matter to him or anybody else?
When I was old enough to give my mom the old "Hell no" when it came to Meetings, she stopped going as well - which made me wonder if she'd just been going for my sake the whole time. As a result, however, my relationship with my cousins changed quite drastically. I hardly saw them and to top if off, my one uncle didn't want my cousin and I interacting because I had become too "worldly". That was the cream on top of the anti-religion sundae for me because now religion was messing with my family and its dynamics and that was/is sacred.
I hardly went to Meetings from the age of 10 except every "Easter" to commemorate Jesus dying for our sins or whatever. The cherry on top happened at my Grandmother's funeral in June 2005. At her funeral service, the Elder (JWs don't have priests, only senior MEN - sexist much? - referred to as Elders who govern the 'church' and its goings-on) who was giving the Talk said - and I paraphrase - that my gran's death shouldn't sadden us the most, instead it should be the fact that those family members who do not attend Meetings and subscribe to the religion would never see her again because she was faithful and would be in Paradise and us..well, not so much. If it walks like condemnation and talks like condemnation, then it must be a duck, right? After that, I was done. I didn't care that he felt that way, I'm sure many of them share the same opinion, but the fact that he had the audacity to mention it at my gran's funeral, when we were all already heartbroken, made my blood boil. I cursed him with 10 plagues!
The thought that at first rented a space in my mind, but has now seemed to have actually bought the property, is that I actually do not have a relationship with God. I feel like a hypocrite and a liar whenever I tell people in times of tragedy, fear, anxiety, stress, that I will keep them (or whoever their loved one is) in my prayers - now I just say "thoughts". My hypocrisy is further exacerbated in situations where I feel those same emotions and I suddenly find myself "turning to God" in the form of prayers that actually sound more like desperate pleas and that generally start with "I know I only turn to you when I need you and I'm sorry for that, BUT if you could please....blah blah". I understand why God pretends he has another call coming through or why he scrunches paper in front of the receiver saying there's bad reception and the line is breaking up. Why would you want to help someone who doesn't call until she needs something? That's abuse!
But now I've realised that I don't know if I even believe in God. I believe in God because I've been taught that there is a God, he created the Earth and all those good things, but how can I believe in something that I don't constantly and consistently have faith in and doesn't occupy an unwavering place in my life and heart? To this day, my (hopefully) well-developed brain still grapples and battles with juvenile questions like if God loves us why do bad things happen?
I would love to have a relationship with God. I would love to have BLIND faith in Him/Her. I would love to know that in my darkest hours I just need to leave my problem at His/Her doorstep and all will be well. I would love to trust that life doesn't have to be as lonely as it can sometimes be because God always walks with you and when you see one set of footsteps in the sand it's because Jesus was carrying you. But I don't. And I don't know how. I don't know how to find my way to the flock. I can't reconcile this honest-to-God (irony is a beautiful thing) yearning and longing with what logically does not make sense to me.
But I guess that's the definition of faith.
