It's not about me.

I always thought faith was something I did for me. I needed to be saved, my soul needed eternal rest and I needed to believe in the resurrection and the cross because it is true and because it is what has worked for my mom and my friends. And I thought that by believing I would be somehow better. But, I didn’t feel better. I still sinned, only then, I noticed it more because, for the first time, I felt guilty. And I wanted to explain to people why I believed and I wanted to believe my words myself, but I hadn’t lived it, I hadn’t become like Christ. I wasn’t even sure how until I realized that faith is not about me.

It’s about love and compassion and vision and caring and it’s about hope and peace and purpose. Faith needs to be something I do for others. Something I do for God because he loved me enough to save me. It should be something I do because it is the only way to truly be good. Because we are dirty — all of us. Deep inside us live crevices that are inhabited by cobwebs and dust and things that take the shine off of the good — making selfless selfish and faith a farce. And so I want to be real. I want to understand everything, politics, humanities, religion, people. And I never want to make a decision, to take a stand, without truly understanding the issue. I’m tired of leaning one way because that’s the way I’m supposed to lean. I’m tired of religious people who go to church every Sunday and talk to their church friends but who don’t care about taking care of things like the environment and the poverty-stricken nations that could use some of the love they save for Sundays. I’m tired of people thinking of little more than America. Because in the grand scheme of things, America is but a speck on the globe, a fortunate, wealthy, freckle that has too many religious people with too many resources who aren’t getting the big picture. I want my faith to be a faith of action and education and truth. And I will never again sit back and let the pulpit decide for me who to vote for and who to be friends with. Because, to truly be like Christ, my agenda needs to be to love like Christ, which is an all-embracing, supernatural love that transcends theology and rhetoric.