I remember a poignant moment in one of the vignettes from Steve Martin’s book, The Cruel Shoes, in which the narrator tells about how his uncle told him he was sorry that he (the narrator, as a young person) had ever heard of the word “God.” This resonated intensely for me when I first read it, which was something else considering I was a true believing Mormon at the time.
I wonder is life really isn’t easier, simpler, and better without God in it at all. I’m not making any kind of vast prescription for society or the world here, and I’m not even really advocating atheism (certainly not the strong kind). I just think maybe existence might be a hell of a lot better if I just completely stopped worrying or even thinking about God and just got on with living my life.
Sailing to Byzantium 
In my experience, even if you aren’t raised with God, you still develop ways to deal with and understand good and evil. Why did I find $20 and not my sister? Why do I feel so small? Why are there so many stars?
Maybe I was really young, and too simplistic, but the easy answer to me was that there was something out there. I had a relationship with God before I even knew what such a thing was. I used to talk to the stars and sky at night before bed, because I didn’t know what prayer was. It just never seemed like I was alone in the world.
I’m afraid I’m not wording it right–not in a way that can describe how powerful it felt to me as a child, and how those experiences have shaped my worldview. I don’t think there are words for it (that metaphor thing again). I’m afraid I sound dorky and insincere, when really it was just that simple.
Well, for whatever it’s worth, I like having God in the world. I feel better off for it.
I feel better off without a personal God (whatever that means), but I recognize within myself the human desire to relate in a personal way to the world around me. I’m just not sure calling it “God” feels right.
Hmm. “Doing without” doesn;t mean atheism, like I said. It certainly means no religion, and no real spiritual practice of any kind (at least not formally), but it doesn;t mean denying a higher/inner/transcendent power/presence/existence.
I just have issues with calling all of that God and thereby lumping it in with God of more fundamentalist, literalist religion.
Understandable.
Of course I have to look at my current predicament through the lens of being raised in the LDS church, but I now feel as though I can “just live my life” now that I’ve got a better understanding of what religion is all about. I don’t know if I would appreciate life, my family, my wife, and the world around me like I do now, but that doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t be just as powerful, or more so, if I hadn’t had a religious upbringing.
All in all, I finally feel as though I CAN live my life, on my terms, and that is a great feeling.
Are there some terms under which you want to live your life that you believe the tenets of Christianity will not stand for or allow? Examples?
I suffer from a kind of ideological claustrophobia. I like Christianity, but I don;t know that I find the idea of an entirely Jesus-flavored live very appealing. Honestly, there’s too much to life and existence to color it all with the same crayon.