I just wrote this in a message to "a friend" (you know who you are) a second ago, and I think it is the closest I've come to diagnosing where I am in a long time:
"Christianity is so tricky. I can't tell where I am with it. Really, I just care about justice and goodness and love and compassion and equality, and I am surrounded by people who equate those things with God. And not just in theory. When they say justice, they mean gay rights and women's rights and economic rights for the poor and everything. So where I'm at, I just superimpose my values on God and Christianity and everyone is fine with it, but really, the God part of the equation could pretty much fall away and I'd be fine. The only function God serves for me anymore is as a champion of all my causes, and as something beautiful to experience. And I think that means my "God" is just a crutch, but when I think of just throwing him out, there is enough of the old Christian in me to feel like faith is another good I'm supposed to be pursuing, so that makes me keep it around. Really, I have no idea what I really believe. I am a total mystery to myself."
Another obvious problem with actually assessing what I think of God has to do with the fact that my potential career is wrapped up in him. So saying no to belief means saying yes to total chaos and uncertainty for my future. But also, part of me is spiritual. Lots of sciency people say that science can fill a spiritual need (by recognizing the magnitude of the universe, or the absolute miracle that all this came to be without a greater hand, and so on), and I definitely understand that, but I just don't think it's enough for me. I just feel a need in me to commune with something bigger than myself, something deep and mystical and invisible and earthy.
Whenever I am with people who don't believe, I think "Thank god, we can finally put away all that nonsense and just admit we're all there is." And whenever I'm with people who believe, I think, "Thank God, we can just stop swirling in doubts and get on with knowing and experiencing the Divine."
But can you really read this and not want to believe in something?
"Every day is a god, each day is a god, and holiness holds forth in time. I worship each god, I praise each day splintered down, splintered down and wrapped in time like a husk, a husk of many colors spreading, at dawn fast over the mountains split.
"I wake in a god. I wake in arms holding my quilt, holding me as best they can inside my quilt.
"Someone is kissing me-already. I wake, I cry 'Oh,' I rise from my pillow. Why should I open my eyes?
"I open my eyes. The god lifts from the water. His head fills the bay. He is Puget Sound, the Pacific; his breast rises from pastures; his fingers are firs; islands slide wet down his shoulders. Islands slip blue from his shoulders and glide over the water, the empty, lighted water like a stage.
"Today's god rises, his long eyes flecked in clouds. He flings his arms, spreading colors; he arches, cupping sky in his belly; he vaults, vaulting and spread, holding all and spread on me like skin."
-Annie Dillard, Holy the Firm
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