Religious people are sometimes told they are supposed to believe that Moses parted the waters, that Jesus rose from the dead, or that someone’s scripture is directly dictated by God. But how could we ever know whether such things really happened? Is faith really just pretending that we really know what happened centuries ago? Is faith betting our lives on the possibilty that some ancient miracle “proves” our religion is right? Is faith running the ultimate bluff? I think it is important for Christians to remember how many times Jesus warned against hypocritical religion. The word “hypocrite” did not mean exactly the same thing it does today. Instead, “hypocrite” referred to the mask actors wore in Greek theatre. It seems to me Jesus was warning against religion that pretends to know what it does not really know or to feel what it does not really feel. It seems to me, if our goal is to love, that pretending to know and feel things only gets in the way. The faith that “saves” us is not belief in religion but trust in the life process. When religious people base their lives on things that they are only pretending to know they cannot be reasonable in modern situations. A commitment to yesterday’s understanding can make us enemies of today’s truth. I believe the one true faith that “saves” us is an allegiance to the web of life and an awakening to the fact that our fates are interwoven.I believe the resurrection that saves us does not belong to any one religion but is an acceptance of the cosmic process where beings arise and fall like waves in the ocean but not a drop of water is lost. Faith is trust in that process.I believe the most valuable parables and stories of any great religion awaken us to who we are in the here and now. Such stories and symbols lead us through the dragons of our fears and desires and into the cave of our own depths. We cannot find love while hiding behind a mask. We cannot find truth any other time than now. I believe the religious pilgrimage most needed is one into the depths of the human heart. Mythic stories are not fantastical historical claims but wondrous guided meditations past our hopes and fears and into the human heart. The treasure is hiding right now behind our pretended thoughts and feelings. The journey is always to here.
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