Matters of faith.. Post 20

So, the world has not ended – yet! Here I was checking to see if the end of world came to any part of the world, with bated breath, only to see no evidence of it. Apparently the man who started it all, Harold Camping is missing in action ever since it became clear that his prediction was not coming true. I don’t blame him. He can’t possibly hang around and claim miscalculation again.

It does make me wonder about blind faith. It is amazing how so many people believe in matter of faith so blindly. I am sure it must take a lot of devotion and belief to have such unwavering faith. I am such a sceptic that I personally find it quite amazing that so many people believe so completely, when it comes to matters of faith.

The other day, I had two men who knocked at my door and tried to sell me some religious propaganda.While I found it very difficult to convey to them that I am not interested. Whatever excuses I came up with, they would counter. Only people who believe strongly that their faith is the ‘right way’, would be able to even try at this level, is what I think. For instance, I have been brought up in a very liberal household where my parents are spiritual, but they have never forced us to do stuff, or believe that our way is the only way. So I have it easy in the sense, that I am not burdened by expectations of the religious sort.My faith or someone else’s faith is no something that matters to me – it is very private, for me. I have met others, who believe so strongly that going to the temple on such or such day, etc.. People who judge people based on their faith. They have grown up in such conditioning that they are able to believe in things like this – without question. Not just believe, also to  convince others that their way of life is the best. While I am not burdened by religious expectations, it also makes me cynical in my approach. I find it difficult to treat ‘God’ as someone who will take care of everything for me. While others who believe, find it much easier to ‘submit’, if I may call it that. To be able to believe that someone up there will ‘take care’. That is what faith is supposed to be, is what I am told.

Faith is something that fascinates me and scares me. It is so easy to convince people of so many things just by invoking faith. The gentlemen who came to my house the other day, was convinced that I was in need of being ‘saved’ and that he is doing humanity a favour by saving souls of non-believers. Similarly, others believe that they need to save their faith by whatever means, violence included. Faith makes people look up to people, and makes them look down on people.

It fascinates me how faith can be such a powerful tool, a tool which could be used to unite and and what truly scares me, is how easy it is to invoke faith to divide.