Regarding the whole “leap of faith” thing-
- Sometimes faith is distinguished as faith because it concerns something that cannot be seen. In that sense, we act on faith all the time in our day to day lives. Entering my cc number online to purchase something is an act of faith. I cannot see the virtual signals and numbers moving through wirelessness. I know that the end result is a package on my doorstep, but I do not monitor the whole process, and don’t really know the first thing about how technology works in that sense. I don’t need to, either. But I also know that I COULD know how it works if I wanted to find out.
- In other ways, I guess faith could be belief in something seemingly impossible, or improbable. The first examples that come to my mind seem to be hope rather than faith. Going through a crisis, you might “have faith” that things will work out for the best… but isn’t that really just hope? Wishing? Perhaps I am wrong in even including that in the definition of faith.
- In the faith sense concerning God, it seems that faith is somewhat of a combination of both. An added factor might be that you can have faith in something reasonably… meaning- even if you haven’t seen it, and it seems rather impossible, you can reason that it is the mostly reasonable explanation and therefore can be taken on faith to be true. If I cannot otherwise explain how the material world came to be, it can logically follow that there exists something outside of the material that brought it into being. If I cannot explain where the order in the universe comes from or is sustained, it could follow that whatever set this universe at work also infused it with order as opposed to chaos. ….
I may be able to stand behind some of that reasoned faith. Maybe. My experience tells me that there are occurrences in my life that seem beyond the realm of scientific perception… patterns noticed, feelings of connectedness, seeming coincidence… but couldn’t all these unexplainable things be due to the fact that, as humans, we’re still relatively ignorant to an in depth understanding of our own species? Couldn’t science at some point discover a perceptible and explainable sixth sense that makes sense of the connectedness and patterns? What then? But even in that, there’s that human element that resists simple scientific rationale. If we are so similar to animals in so many ways, what accounts for the ways in which we are so distinct? Ultimately, why? If I am just one creature- a creature with a birthday moving toward a deathday like every ringworm and prairie dog in existence- why is it that I ask why? Where does this ability to reflect on purpose and meaning come from, and what is to be done with it?
A second level of resistance comes from trying to move the leap of faith into a practice of religion. A rationalized leap of faith might move me toward a belief in God, but where does Jesus Christ factor into all this? I don’t know at what point I will be able to say, “Yes, I believe a man who was also God walked on this earth, died, but then physically rose into heaven and will come again.” I don’t know how I can possibly say I believe in that, and I don’t know how I can believe that without proof, which is where this leap is supposed to bridge the gap, I guess.
“The whole point of faith is that there isn’t proof, that’s why it’s faith.” I make acts of faith like internet purchasing, but only because I am aware that the process is knowable, and that I could understand it if I wanted to. With the idea of dying and rising and being God and man, it is asking me to believe something so very outside of what seems possible, all based on old evidence (?), all of which is supposed to have some deep personal impact on me and also be a huge factor in where I spend an eternity after this lifetime of trying to figure it out. To me, it just doesn’t seem fair. It doesn’t seem fair that our reason sets us apart from animals, but when it comes to religion, it’s only allowed to take us so far.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve whispered into the dark, “Jesus, are you God?”
