What would the death of religion sound like?

Have you ever wondered about that (refer to title)? Do you ever think about the mountain of dead gods who are no longer worshiped? Or maybe what the last believer is thinking as he dies? To know that a whole religion, a whole ideology, will die with you...if nothing else, your life is historically important. How does one kill a religion? With sceptisism or murder? Will my religion ever die? It's lasted a while but it would be close minded to shut out the idea that the god I worship may one day be held in the same esteem as Zeus.

If that's the case does that mean the god I worship would be any less real? How do I know the Greeks didn't have it right and all the gods are just chilling right now? Does the apparent evolution of religion point towards the falseness of all religion? Or maybe it points out the falseness of all other religions except of course the truth, (insert your religion here). Or maybe the true religion is something we are approaching but not at. As our religions evolve, they will become the "true" one. But unless God (or the gods) tell us, how are we to ever know? Sorry that all my sentences seem to be questions but I find the concept of a religion dying fascinating.

Why Spiritual Retreats can have nothing to do with God.

So I neglected to mention it but I helped to run a religious hiking retreat this past weekend. However, while others may have been thinking about God, honestly I thought less of Him than usual. As a leader, I was consumed by logistics. People may seem smart but just go on a retreat with them, people are stupid. People left their sleeping bags at old camp sites for no reason at all, others thought we were joking when we asked them to bring flashlights...it was bad. But the Lord carried us through it all. But another problem I had were these cute girls...it wasn't good. I'm sure from my writings/ravings you would assume I'm way too odd to be attractive to the opposite sex but I'm good at using the twisted logic of mine to humor. I don't know, maybe I was imagining it but in any case, a few girls were distracting me through out the retreat. That's the issue I always have. It's never one girl that I can pursue and care for. Something, probably just my stupidity makes it to where I pursue more than one gal and then if they both respond positively...well I try to process who would be better to pursue...that can take a while. Anyway, God wasn't central to my retreat experience and I think it's a shame. Here's my talk if you are interested:

My Life is in Your Hands

Hello, in case there is anyone here that doesn’t know, my name is James Hubbard and my talk’s name is “My Life is in Your Hands” Another fact you may be interested in knowing is that when I was first given this talk topic, I would have been willing to trade it for any other one because I don’t fit the ideal at all.

I grew up as the baby of my family with my younger sibling being 8 years older than me. While I was always shown love, it was usually tough. If I wanted to play a game, I would never win so that I would get better. If I wanted to talk, I had to talk in a mature manner. And if I wanted to have something done, I usually had to do it. My parents had dealt with two teenagers while I was growing up and as they were trying to teach my brother and sister how to be an adult, they also taught me. The biggest thing stressed was self reliance. I was to be a somber adult who needed no real assistance by a young age, not because my parents didn’t care about me but because they were so tired. And I’m not complaining, it has made me a much stronger person…but that also makes me not want to depend on anyone, even God.

As I said, I didn’t think I was the right guy for this talk. I have trouble depending on anyone, let alone putting my life in the hands of some supernatural being I’ve never even seen. I’d imagine myself to be like Peter in the reading. Peter was a fisherman; he had dealt with his fair share of bad weather. Do you think his first reaction was to wake up Jesus? I doubt it. I imagine the fishermen of the 12 trying to do all they had learned through their trade to keep the boat afloat and out of danger. Why wake Jesus? He’s just a carpenter. He would have no idea how to save the boat. What would Jesus know of their problem? Then finally, after all else failed they turned to Jesus to wake Him up, not to ask for help but to let Him share in their despair that they were all to die. And once they confided their fears to Him, He saved them from the fear and rebuked them for even doubting that He could handle it.

I feel like I do this. The thinking goes like this: “I don’t see Jesus so He’s not here with me. He isn’t around so clearly He can’t help me. Jesus isn’t on any boat with me, I’m by myself but even if He were here, He wouldn’t know how to help. Jesus is just some mythical character in a book all the adults in the church wanted me to read. What’s He going to do? What would Jesus know of my problems? Jesus is useless, only I can save myself.”

Let me share a quote from a man as reliable as God, Morgan Freeman: “If someone prayed for the family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them opportunities to love each other?” To me, that’s beautiful. Do I have to pretend to believe God is some superman who will come to save the day by explicitly solving all our problems or answering all our prayers? No, in fact, I would be very irritated if all my prayers were answered when I’m sure there are others in the world who need God’s intervention more. Besides, I was raised to be self reliant and to depend on only those who proved they were dependable.

And I don’t like to admit this but I can’t help but have a lot of doubts about God. It really does seem like He’s asleep a lot, doesn’t it? So many of the prayers we keep silent in our hearts…they go unanswered, don’t they? So why should we trust this guy? We asked, we loved, we followed, and He didn’t give us our wages, our wishes did He? Why should we depend on Him when He doesn’t appear to be very dependable?

Well I’m not going to say I’ve got it down by a long shot but I think it has to do with God and us having a common goal but He’s just a lot smarter than us. An example of this would be in high school freshman year, I asked this girl out that I had a crush on. Before our first date though, she cancelled and said she thought it would be better if we were just friends. I was crushed and looked to God with the question of why. It wasn’t until the next year that I really did spend a lot of time with her as a friend, and you know what, she was not my type at all. Which was weird because at the time I didn’t even know I had a type. But it ended up that the two of us not dating was the best conclusion that could have been reached. I know that now but I couldn’t see her for her at the time. But God did, He sees all of what makes us great and what makes us fall. And He has the same goal as us, for our happiness. He just thinks of the long run more (and better) than we do.

And while I’m on this topic I might as well try to answer this. Want to know why I don’t trust God sometimes? Because I don’t want what He wants. Sure we both want me to be happy but His version of it seems much worse than my idea. I think He wants me to be a meek subdued creation that does as He wills much like a puppet. Have a problem? Let’s pray. Don’t know what’s happening? Turn to God. Want to love and marry? First make sure God doesn’t want you to be a priest. What is the point of this life if God just wants us to give it back to Him in such an unoriginal fashion? Should I turn to God with all problems or should I learn to appreciate His Will as I solve my own problems? God, this life is so refreshing and intoxicating, why would I sacrifice this to go into servitude. Sometimes it seems like while you may have the water of eternal life, I’d much prefer to live and die my own dehydrated life before I live under your tyranny. Is this pride? But where is my sin? I only want to live and love without the command to. To be able to have spite without the guilt. God has given us emotions and yet how often are we allowed to embrace them in His eyes? And while I may not logically think this completely, sometimes I feel the belief of it within my heart.

However, shouldn’t instead we humble ourselves? Shouldn’t we realize that a god that loved us enough to create us loves us enough to make sure that life is full of smiles, rains, and scents of honeysuckles and freshly cut grass? Sure it’s also full of war, cancer, and famine. But how many of these pains are brought on us by men? And of those that we can attribute to God, how many of them don’t in some way actually enhance the love and closeness of those involved? After all, (watch out I’m about to get really philosophical) how could we truly grasp the sweetness of a lollipop without the bland stick in the middle of it? So much of our feelings are based on relative things. Maybe that’s the problem; I think that’s what God’s been trying to free me from. It’s not being enslaved by Him, but rather emancipated, or freed from the world to live the good life He wishes for me. But I suppose I shouldn’t expect the world to tell me that.

So something I’ll strive to do is to put my life in His hands instead of the world’s hands. Looking back God has helped me whenever there were rough storms, even when I didn’t ask Him to. He’s on my boat. He’s in all our boats, but can we humble ourselves to ask Him for help? Or something I’ve had to ask myself is: will my pride keep me from putting my life in His hands?

Our Old Photographs

Today to dodge writing a lab report, I spent too much time on facebook. In the process I looked at one of my friend's old pictures. It was then that I noticed something peculiar. It was an old picture of her, from high school in her jeep. No one had commented on it or even liked it yet of all the pictures of herself she had taken down, it remained. And I wondered what the picture meant to her and also what it meant to me and if we still hoped the same girl inside the photo was inside of her.

You see even though I have only known her for about six years, she has changed much more than anyone else I know in the time I've known her. To give you a better perspective on how ridiculous that is I should mention that I have had a group of friends since kindergarten and their personalities since then have changed a lot but not nearly as much as her personality.

And so I look at the girl in the picture with some of her shoulder length hair draped over half of her acne spotted face, with a look of confusion and uncertainty yet calm, with the body language of one who is already giving up and so keep their shoulders slumped. This is how I want to remember her, unsure yet calm in her light cotton jacket as grey as the world must seem to her.

Now she's not certain nor calm. She has taken a road of life that she isn't sure about but she's tired of not doing anything and so now her hair that draped over her face so freely has been confined in gel for her mohawk, her body has tattoos about authors such as Ayn Rand and she is quite positive that she is without a doubt most probably at least possibly bi if not completely a lesbian. But none of that would bother me if she was happy but she seems so far from that word. Sarcastic, bitter, and aggressive she has assured me that at least she has seen through the lies of religion and seen that living only for the moment is the way to live one's life. Again I should mention, I don't think I've ever seen her so miserable. But don't worry, she's traveling around the world now enjoying the sites. In fact, it seems like she's scared not to travel. As if her not recognizing where she is prevents her from realizing she doesn't even recognize who she is. And so she runs. She runs to any relationship, any drug, any drink, any philosophy, anything that makes her forget for just a little while that she has no idea who she is or what she's becoming.

But this is more than a casual interest in someone else and their life, isn't it? You're right, I was completely infatuated with the girl in the photograph. To me, she was beautiful. Then we didn't hang out for a while and a lot of changes happened to her. But I still wanted to be with her and possibly help her with anything to make her make better decisions and be happier in the long run. I wanted to visit the girl I'd once known and see if she still resided in any of the person I see nowadays. I think she is still in there, she's just as unsure as she always was and so doesn't know how to fix herself. But I'm not sure if I can help her...ugh, life sucks. Everyone has to choose things for themselves. So now that we are in different colleges I can't do anything more than facebook chat with her and pray that if my prayers mean anything to anyone, they help her.

I think we always see what we want to remember from photographs. We see past the picture and into the eyes of the person, we see eyes full of something different than what's in there now. Is it healthy to already have regrets before I'm even 30? Well if I must have them, I can at least strive to reduce any future regrets...I guess that's a constellation...I hate what I see in my old photographs.

When Wednesdays Feel like Mondays

Well school has started up again. I suppose the semester should be fine though I worry about taking 17 hours plus research. Luckily, I'm a genius (it should be said that at my first attempt of spelling it, I misspelled "genius"). Anyway, that doesn't really matter. What's much more interesting is that I am not sure if I should give a talk on a religious retreat. If I write an honest talk, there is no way it will be permitted because I am not feeling faithful to God and I am really apathetic about being so. I am pretending like a champ though, I'm hoping that if I pretend long enough it will become real. I'll lose myself in character and be a good man pursuing God. That would be nice. But still, I have a voice in me that critiques everything faithful that goes through my head, my skepticism may kill my faith at this rate yet I still am apathetic about fixing it. Even as I write this I'm becoming bored about the topic of God and want to go onto facebook or something. That's what I am becoming...how dreadful. O well, I'll go check my email now.

I won the lottery

No, I'm not going to be rich. But it feels like I have won the lottery in that I've been born in a country where luxury is the norm and most people dream of even the lower class life style in this country. But while we all may say this with pride, we either don't truly keep this in mind or we are immoral. To have power is to have responsibility. It's a directly linear relationship. We should be helping our impoverished brethren but instead we compete with each other for even more wealth. Or even worse than striving for more wealth and power, most of us become sloths and just relish our overabundance. It's shameful but no one is strong enough and also moral enough to stop us. And so we live our lives insulated from others and their cries of woe. We do not treat them as our neighbors, we barely treat them better than enemies. I won the lottery and yet I am overburdened with the task of being just. And so the thought creeps into my head that it would be better to not have power just so that I can sleep better at nights because I realize that I am not strong enough to be as just as my wealth demands and so I wish to forfeit it. I am not worthy because I am not willing.

God prefers the Gingers: Fact

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this, mainly because I don't think anyone reading would care but this summer I'm doing some engineering research. One of my co-researchers is from China and we have fun discussing many things different about our cultures. Another one of my researching buddies is an aggressive christian. Aggressive in that if you don't even believe the same flavor of Christianity, he will humbly show you how you are clearly in the wrong. Poor chinese researcher didn't have a chance. He drew her into a conversation about a god she didn't believe in and asked her what she believed in. Let me just say, telling someone like him something like "I'm not sure yet" is infinitely better than "We are a part of a multiverse that science has proven...well, will prove. We don't need God to exist to explain why we exist." She chose the latter and he had a question or two for her.

Later this week, I was picking her up at where she ate lunch. Since I couldn't park there, I illegally (I hope this doesn't count as evidence...) parked at an episcopal church. As I pointed out that I parked illegally she noticed where I parked and so we ended up talking about episcopals and other christians and which I was. Honestly, I'm not sure I can count as a whole christian because I find myself finding Jesus...well I guess I just can't find where he fits in my theology. I like to think God is too big to be contained within a religion. This is what I answered with: "I was raised (in) and I suppose I follow the Catholic Church. But I like to think that if there is a god, He's much bigger than any religion we could make and so in a way, we are all wrong." She agreed and said she figured as much herself so she might as well be atheist until she finds God...as if He could be figured out, the scientists of this world have looked at too many puzzles and heard too many natural laws, and so we start to think that God must adhere to the laws and He too must be a puzzle. We are all fools regardless of if He is or isn't.

So then we talked of why she would be atheist if she acknowledges there may be something worth being spiritual over while also asking why I would be Catholic full well believing the dogma is incomplete. We seemed to believe very similar things and yet here we were on the opposite sides of the theological spectrum. At one point, we mentioned our environment and how being spiritual doesn't cost me anything while it would cost her a lot in China.

Eventually we turned our talk to why Christianity may be incomplete and where something needed to be added (for you see we too are saints, we are priests, we are the pastors of our own church and so we strove to figure out what was to be preached should anyone come to our pulpit) and we mused on individuality. I pointed out how huge individuality is in Christianity and in fact how that is probably how Christianity gained power. From the Jewish "people" God suddenly changes His care to the individuals. Before He would only have relationships with the leaders of a group, now He wants to have an intimate relationship with each of the sheep in His flock...Such a change no doubt helped Christianity flourish. But that's why I love the Catholic Church over the other Christian denominations. It understands that we are all together. We are together the "Body of Christ," individually we are nothing but pieces of a body. Now that may seem like a downer for some but it's so sensible compared to the alternative I think.

We are all a community. We are one together but separate? Well, man is a social creature and as such it seems even technology is in accord with becoming one body as we all slowly merge our pictures, thoughts, bank accounts, lives online. We are slowly becoming more of a hive mind where leaders are no longer distinguished men but merely the mascots of ideologies that must clash. It does tickle the pride to think that I alone am enough. Enough for what? I don't know but I do know that we were not built to be loners. Tribes, gangs, from these governments led by men, from these governments led by the populace (for better or for worse), we have slowly been merging ourselves and rarely has anyone looked back. Just think, where now could a man go to be free from all forms of government? Where does anarchy reside in this day in age? And remember, anarchy also comes with laws, it's just that individuals instead of groups make them. Is that so horrifying? Hitler led a nation to commit atrocities, what if his law only affected one man, himself? Wouldn't that have been so much better? No, the individual is dying.

So with that in mind. Please let us stop assuming we know what God likes. I'm tired of the red team's fans thinking Red team scores= God's Will while the blue team, much more enlightened, regards the true truth to be Blue Team scores= God's Will. Sometimes I can't help but think God cares nothing for our pathetic squabbles, our different clans, our differences. We are one people, white or black or red or yellow. I'd imagine God cares nothing for such trivial differences as race, nationality, gender, or even hair color.

Well except for the gingers...God's gotta love them, otherwise the rest of us would have wiped them out by now.

So Far Away From Everyone

What is music? So many people seem to use it, others seem to feel it, and still others seem to be immersed in it. Is it poetry with a background noise or a pulse felt through instruments with some paltry words attached to give the rhythm a story to match the emotion? I'm sure most would say it's a mix of the two. A compromise of the two ideals, that's life isn't it?

I'm not sure if my ideals are the diluted form of another man's ideals or the culmination of the greatest minds' beliefs in a mixture caused by ideological darwinism. But either way it seems clear that my thoughts are not in fact my own. My personality makes me much more lenient and forgiving than other people but that's just it. "Than other people," it's relative. We may choose where on the spectrum we are but our environment chooses what is even on the spectrum. An example of this would be with different bosses and the forgiveness the company has with you being late. Sure the slack boss will give you an extra 10 minutes to get here in a strict company but in a slack company the boss may not even care if you come to work as long as you get your work done. Same man on the same place in the spectrum but the spectrum chose where he fell.

Interesting, heck it's riveting! But why does this matter? I guess in a way it doesn't and I'm not sure how we'd change it if it did matter but it just frustrated me to think that my decisions are not truly my own. I choose, but only where on a blueprint I shall set my foundation. Almost the illusion of free will in how it's constricted...I don't know, maybe it isn't that bad.

Maybe our environment's choices are just tools we can use to express ourselves more completely. Maybe I'm just rambling on and the one unfortunate person reading this other than me is even more confused than me on this subject. Maybe I think too much. Maybe this is a symptom of why I can't have a normal conversation with people. Maybe I try to stay theoretical so stay away from the real. And the real is that I don't understand myself. I prefer dark to light, I try to love others but always try to hide my affection, I truly enjoy walking in nature but only allow it if I've exhausted myself running, I feel guilty if a teacher helps me a little in one class but willingly cheat in others, I want to find a woman to date but find actual intimacy something I prefer to push off, I want to grow closer to God but always seem to push Him off until tomorrow... The world seems to be a complex puzzle and the truth is that I am just one piece that doesn't belong anywhere. But unlike most people, I won't fit the mold. If I can't be me and fit well in the world then I shall be it's outlier, I will shine in all my contradictions and when the accusers finally turn to me I shall laugh and dance to the guillotine.

I haven't really lived a good full life but from what has filled my life up, I can say this much with confidence: I will never be happy unless I can relax. I can't relax unless I am myself. And finally, I have no idea who I am.

If this is my destiny than maybe I should accept it. Ugh, talk about the illusion of free will. "Destiny" "Fate" "Divine Plan" Ugh. If any of those cop outs exist, we would all do best to ignore them. If there is a divine plan and God chooses not to tell me about it, then clearly He wishes me to continue my current plan, yes? To submit one's will to a man is pitiful, to an idea...the most enslaving or emancipating thing that could exist. I can't decide which.

But look at all these thoughts, spilled out on the web as chaos. Is there form to this or is it free verse? Even I am trying to remember if there was a point to this other than to talk things out and read over it. And what about you? Yes, you. The one reader I have, why are you here reading. Did the title's implied theme of isolation draw you in hoping to hear that someone's feeling just like you? Or maybe you are bored at work or home and prefer to read this than to think about your life (reading random people's blogs at home...)? Or maybe I even told you about this blog and you think you'll learn more about me from it? Did it work?

Ruby Falls just came on Grooveshark. And suddenly the questions fade to my mind syncing with the melody. Then I look at the clock and think I should get a good night's sleep. And so I have been so easily contented. Is that how we live our lives? On the edge of true introspection only to be pulled out by all the sounds and stimulation of our environment? Is this how everyone lives and if so, why don't we push it all out? Is that why we hold on to our ipods so much? Why the TV in homes are never off. Why it is a social necessity to spend a lot of time with people to not be considered weird? Are we protecting ourselves from figuring out who we are or are just scared that we aren't the heroes in the story? We aren't the warm cuddly ball of sunlight the world orbits around. We are just people, there have been billions before us with dreams as big as ours and what have we seen from their labors? ...TV dinners? Rising rates of depression? Unstable consumption? Is that why we resonate so much with the Fall of Man story? Because secretly, we all know (though we shudder to admit) that we are not what was meant, we are not good, we are broken and yet have no way to fix ourselves.

I am James Hubbard and I am a waste of resources. There is no way to justify why the gallons of clean water spent to maintain my daily life could not go to others more needing and for that matter deserving. I will try to justify it through my quest to save the world. To bring these goods to those who could never pay for them. But like the main character in every good story, I have serious faults. I am not unique except in that I choose to embrace my mediocrity and yet will not settle for it. I will strive until the day I die, and for this, that day will come much sooner. I plan on failing my own plan to save the world from itself but I must still try. I must shake everyone out of the everyday. I must make people see that people across the world bleed just like their neighbors do.

People aren't supposed to think like this. This isn't true thought is it? No, it must be an ideology. And such a strange one. It would set any of its believers apart from others. So here I am, so far away from everyone...