Questioning Faith

All the talk about The DaVinci Code has got me thinking. (...and NOBODY wants THAT.)

Rail on Ron Howard's short-comings as a filmmaker all you want to.
Critique Tom Hanks' acting ability (or hairdo) to death, if you like.
Stomp all over the book's weak premise, if that's how you see it.

Cool. What bugs me, though is the idea that the REAL problem with this film was the fact that it dared to QUESTION something important like long-held beliefs.

I know somebody who verbally kicks the shit out of religion on a fairly regular basis. I generally disagree with his methods, because I think his lack of respect for religious doctrine needn't manifest itself as disrespectful words directed at the religious people. He says he feels so strongly about the lies of religion because he sees so much potential (and historical) harm associated with them. I've not prepared to say that religion does more harm than good and I strongly doubt most other folks know, on a global scale, whether we've suffered or gained more, overall.

Now, however, I'm leaning a bit further in his direction.

Why? Well, I'm concerned about the idea that faith and questioning are mutually exclusive. The idea that faith is everything suggests that questioning is valueless. If that seems like a stretch, again, I submit people's reactions to questions posted by The DaVinci Code (not just the commercial products). Going back even further, I remember multiple times that I asked "the wrong questions" with regard to religion. One time, in college, I was still on what one might call a spiritual journey.

No, not like Caine from "Kung Fu."

No. I was doing something I'd been doing since high school - trying to find and define my spiritual identity. In the process, I visited various churches and talked with a number of different people. After attending a function organized by a faith-based group, I spoke with some of these nice folks. Unfortunately, the same thing that lead me to them was the thing that caused them to push me away - my questions. They wouldn't even TALK to me any further until I agreed to accept Jesus Christ as my personal savior. Personally, I don't take statements like that lightly and, to me, that's just what they were doing by expecting someone to do that, on the spot, when he's still trying to find his way.

I also think about Sunday School, which I attended for a hot minute before my questions about the lessons became a problem. It wasn't like I wouldn't let things proceed until I got all of my answers. It was the fact that I wouldn't just believe things that didn't make sense to me. To this day, I see little reason why I should. I don't know if they booted me or if I simply felt so unwelcome that I stopped attending, but I'm confident that the problem was my questions.

Sometimes logic doesn't work. I realize that. Sometimes, people do "the right thing" because they've been emotionally inspired to do so or because they've been given a set of values that didn't make sense to them, at the time, but that ultimately were worthwhile.

Ultimately, anything that strongly frowns upon those who question ideas, long-held beliefs, opinions, or traditions... isn't just "not for me." It's damned dangerous and sets up a messed up foundation of thinking, devaluing and lowering the standards of logic to sub-atomic levels. I have a hard time believing we're better-off that way. And if we are, maybe we don't deserve to be.