It was exactly ten years ago when I started smoking. This was also the time I started to actively participate in sessions that require you to finish at least 5 bottles of beer, which, to me, was the same as driking rat's piss (though I had and have never dared try). At the same time, I vigorously asked questions that would later weaken the flimsy thread through which my faith in the divine being rested.
More than getting rid of my innocence, my 20th year was a time of personal quests for truths and for the Truth. So I allowed myself not just to lose my religion, but to lose faith, as well. I had to doubt what I had been led to believe, especially those that were not instilled in me through personal discoveries, conclusions and argumentations.
I became a skeptic, and did not start with something easier to deal with at that. I had to go straight to the age-old controversy of God's existence.
To cut the story short, it got me nowhere. If not fallacies, I encountered contradictions. And so, I decided I had to give it a rest.
Ten years later, I am introduced to the question once again. Now, however, I have phrased it in a more sensible way.
I would like to know what my stand really is on the concept of God. What is God to me? What does his existence or non-existence have to do with me?
I have no idea where this will lead me, but at least, this will give me something to keep myself busy with.
My God
I am aware that in order to get to a more rational position on the issue, I have to stop thinking of God as a being of flesh and blood. A 360-turn from the anthropomorphic understanding of God is necessary to free myself from the clutch of medieval thought. I have to start from scratch, careful not to take in absurdities and contradictions.
As there are quickly two positions on the subject of the divine being, I would like to start by talking about them- God exists and God does not exist.
Of course, it does not take a 3rd grader to understand that saying, "I do not believe this or that exists" is enough to warrant a thing's non-existence. For it could exist without me knowing it (or whether you believe it or not). For all I know, there are other creatures in the universe that we do not know of, and saying that there is none is downright hasty for I would never be able to exhaust space to check if the Earth is, indeed, the only planet in the universe that has life. In other words, my position on God's existence does not have anything to do with His existence. In the same manner that my writing about it neither, in anyway, add to nor diminish the existence or non-existence.
On the other hand, the fact that we do not and will not know for sure what other things exist, thanks to our very limited knowledge and rationality, will never be sufficient to prove a thing's existence. It is absurd to claim that somewhere in the depths of the ocean, there is a certain kind of fish that has tentacles and glows like a thousand light bulbs. There is no way to verify the truth of the claim, and therefore cannot really be considered true. At least not yet. Until you find one.
Again, saying God exists or not is merely a comfortable assertion and no bearing on the truth about what it claims.
I do not have a hundred years to live. I am but a speck of infinity, whose signigicance is nothing compared to a dust in the breadth of time. I will probably not live to see the day when man finally finds the soundest proof of God's existence, so I will use whatever I have at this moment to see if my belief (should I choose to believe) in God is founded.
First, I see the sense in claiming that everything comes from something. This laptop that I am using to write this position paper with has been assembled from smaller parts. Cars are the same. Houses, phones, etc. Even the air you breathe is composed of particles that come from nuclear fission and fusion of stars. Let us not even get to the details of how come winds move.
Assuming that the Science we know is correct, then we know that this (the concept of something coming from another) is something that's as inevitable as birth (or perhaps, rebirth) in our universe.
I see God here. I see him as that which nothing else precedes, from which everything else comes. If it so happens that there are several of these, which nothing else precedes, so be it.
Everything has to come from something.
Second, though I know that to some extent, the poem, Invictus, makes sense, I could not completely say that I am the master of my fate or the captain of my soul. There have been countless events where there was nothing I could do that could alter their course. In these moments, I can only watch as things happen. This morning, for example, there was nothing I could do but hope the rain would let up a little, so it would still be safe to drive to work and then back home. It is the same kind of prayer that I mumble when news about an impending earthquake is believed to occur soon.
These events that I attribute to chance are easily clear manifestations of my inability to be the sole master of my fate. I could plan what decisions I would be making in the days, weeks, months and years to come. And though these decisions play a very large part of how my future will turn out to be, chance can never be discounted from it.
It should already be clear that I see chance as that, which, other than myself or people in general, causes events that help shape my future. Chance is that immemorial root of universal mechanisms responsible for making the planets go round the sun, for making the earth a habitable place, for gravity that enables stars to hold their centers, for the seasons, and for the rain, among many others. Chance is also a product of cause and effect, which necessitates a beginning, bringing us back to that which nothing else precedes.
Now, this conception of God does not really help. Depending on the perspective I am looking at it from, I could see myself still straddling two sides- that of the believers and the non-believers.
Chance and Alpha (the Beginning) merely reduce the unfathomable concept to lexical reprentations- words. I have proved nothing but that I could call these two concepts God alternatively. Worse, I think I have just opened this to another possible debate on how the truth of a statement could be dependent on how the words are being used. What is clear, though, is that by rationalizing what for me is God, I detach myself from the traditional conception of his being man's projection- physically, emotionally and psychologically. My God is amoral, limitless and and devoid of any form of desires.
This understanding of God, though rudimentary at best, enables me to act more freely based on what I think is right (Rightness is another concept that should be discussed independently, however). It does not inhibit me from growing, for satiating my hunger for knowledge, for being responsible for my actions, and for having some sense of self worth.
It is also this idea that allowed me, ironic as it may seem, to start smoking and trying that dreadfully tasting beer for the first time. I knew nothing about the world, and I was not just about to take others' words for it. This life has been given to me either for a purpose or without. Either way, I would not be giving my life essence if I am not ready to find answers.
I resolve that even if it were just some accident that brought me here, I am determined to give it purpose if Chance is to be my God. On the other hand, if everything is predetermined by some grand design, I believe that by beguiling myself with established norms and beliefs I am not just being irresponsible, but also ungrateful for everything that I wake up to each day of my life.
So, now, ten years later, I still find myself staring blankly at something thinking about what is really God to me.
Her Kindly Eyes
I wonder if there was ever a time when she loved Emily D.
When she would "look back on time with kindly eyes". I wonder if she ever pondered on the imagery from each line, and be wary about what the enjambments mean.
But through her eyes, I see only survival, and though not very familiar with Darwin, she has the eyes of someone trying to be the fittest.
Just the other night I asked, "What do you plan to do about it?"
Almost in a whisper, she asked, "What do you think?"
Then I hoped to find somewhere in my mind things that I could share. I thought about that rainy night, when I had to sleep under a tree, with two big bags full of clothes and books, hoping the rain would stop, and let me sleep for even just a couple of hours. What could I tell her from that? That the rain did not listen to my prayers? And I had to run to a nearby church where, when I thought I had slept for a few minutes, people attending mass came?
I thought about Emily, too, and how she seems to hold the world with her words, how she seems to have something to say about the most banal of life. She talked about afternoons, about the breeze that makes the leaves of the trees rustle. Still, I was not sure if those were her exact words, but at least those images were the ones I remember.
I also thought about the prince that concerned himself only about goals, believing the end can justify the means.
I muttered, "Priorities".
She kept quiet for some time, and said, "The little one has taken a liking to him, too, you know? She even asked if he was going to be her new dad."
I thought, what would they say to that?
I told her that reminded me of one Christmas when I had to go back home, without a single centavo in my pocket. I only had my ticket with me. I got on the boat, only to find out two hours later, after the ship had departed, that I had lost my wallet, with my ticket inside.
Then I told her about a time when I left home for the first time in my life to go to college. On the bus to the city where a ship would take me to Manila, an old lady gave me a cookie. I must have looked so terrified at what was going to happen to me in a place so far away from home that she thought a cookie would make me feel better.
"And?" she asked, not quite sure what my stories had to do with all she said.
I looked at her again. She was very young when her father left them. She raised her brothers and sisters. That she did in between her classes in school. She graduated, and found a stable job. She has always been her family's only hope, the father they never had. Five years ago, she became a mother, too.
She does not care about what Emily has to say about the lillies of the pond or that the prince would kill for his goals. She gets up at 5, helps her daughter prepare for school, teaches at 7, begins her regular office job at 9 and gets home by 8 in the evening. I wish I knew what the exact words then. I would have told her something common, written in the most beautiful way possible, that she would...
"Look back on time with kindly eyes,
doubtless she did her best,
How softly sinks her trembling sun
In human nature's west!"
Instead, I said, "And...I think you know what to do."
When she would "look back on time with kindly eyes". I wonder if she ever pondered on the imagery from each line, and be wary about what the enjambments mean.
But through her eyes, I see only survival, and though not very familiar with Darwin, she has the eyes of someone trying to be the fittest.
Just the other night I asked, "What do you plan to do about it?"
Almost in a whisper, she asked, "What do you think?"
Then I hoped to find somewhere in my mind things that I could share. I thought about that rainy night, when I had to sleep under a tree, with two big bags full of clothes and books, hoping the rain would stop, and let me sleep for even just a couple of hours. What could I tell her from that? That the rain did not listen to my prayers? And I had to run to a nearby church where, when I thought I had slept for a few minutes, people attending mass came?
I thought about Emily, too, and how she seems to hold the world with her words, how she seems to have something to say about the most banal of life. She talked about afternoons, about the breeze that makes the leaves of the trees rustle. Still, I was not sure if those were her exact words, but at least those images were the ones I remember.
I also thought about the prince that concerned himself only about goals, believing the end can justify the means.
I muttered, "Priorities".
She kept quiet for some time, and said, "The little one has taken a liking to him, too, you know? She even asked if he was going to be her new dad."
I thought, what would they say to that?
I told her that reminded me of one Christmas when I had to go back home, without a single centavo in my pocket. I only had my ticket with me. I got on the boat, only to find out two hours later, after the ship had departed, that I had lost my wallet, with my ticket inside.
Then I told her about a time when I left home for the first time in my life to go to college. On the bus to the city where a ship would take me to Manila, an old lady gave me a cookie. I must have looked so terrified at what was going to happen to me in a place so far away from home that she thought a cookie would make me feel better.
"And?" she asked, not quite sure what my stories had to do with all she said.
I looked at her again. She was very young when her father left them. She raised her brothers and sisters. That she did in between her classes in school. She graduated, and found a stable job. She has always been her family's only hope, the father they never had. Five years ago, she became a mother, too.
She does not care about what Emily has to say about the lillies of the pond or that the prince would kill for his goals. She gets up at 5, helps her daughter prepare for school, teaches at 7, begins her regular office job at 9 and gets home by 8 in the evening. I wish I knew what the exact words then. I would have told her something common, written in the most beautiful way possible, that she would...
"Look back on time with kindly eyes,
doubtless she did her best,
How softly sinks her trembling sun
In human nature's west!"
Instead, I said, "And...I think you know what to do."
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