certainties

My darling husband is a fan of Sam Harris. As I've said before, I like him (Sam Harris, that is) in small doses. He is brilliant and a bit less caustic than his atheist peers. I think he makes a lot of interesting observations on faith.

I heard him say something the other day though, that stuck to me. He was talking about the still yet unknown implications of science, in the realm of human behavior. And he said something like (this is my paraphrase, but you get the idea):

We know that love is better than hate. But there will be a time where we will be able to prove biochemically why it is better.

Oooh baby. He is one smooth talker, isn't he?

I realize the man is a neuroscientist. And what do I know? He might be a hopeless romantic ... wooing his true love with poetry and roses. But really ... why the hell do we need biochemistry to tell us that love is better than hate?

Besides my belief that the great scientific minds of our time could be better occupied than trying to prove something my four year old could easily verify based on her short life experience, the idea seems so fundamentally flawed. I reject the very notion that we can, or should, take the beauty and wonder of human emotion and define it as a scientific formula.

There are a lot of things I find I have jettisoned on my faith walk. It is scary, in a lot of ways. But it feels truer, freer, more authentic. Like I am no longer struggling to convince myself or be convinced about things that never made sense to me.

Still, I find myself continually drawn to the sense that there is More. More than the quantifiable formulas that either science or religion offer us.

Scientists and theologians both admit there are limits to what can be known. But somehow they both believe to be the authority on what we do know. And to be able to best guess on the things we don't. That being said, I DO think it might be helpful if religion didn't fight for equal footing with science in the realm of things that are tangible and measurable. Science does seem to have a much better track record (the world being round and the earth rotating around the sun and all that ...), and it just makes us look kind of silly in the end.

I think there is truth and beauty to be found in Christianity. That I have been blessed enough to find those things within it. But I do not believe that Christianity is the sole, or even the highest source of truth.

We say that's it's not so much about dogma right? I've heard that before. Our paths to God look different and there's room for that, right? But what I'm finding is that there are always things that are not on the table. Our paths to God are valid ones ... IF we believe in the inspiration of the bible. Or that Jesus was born of a virgin, or that Jesus is the one way to salvation. Or we accept the fallenness of man ... or whatever. So it's not about our theology. Except, when it comes right down to it, it really is.

More formulas, I think. Quantifying things we maybe have no business quantifying.

Probably that sounds arrogant. Like I think I can suddenly reinvent the things of God according to my whims. I think I would have said that about these words myself a year ago.

But I don't think it is arrogant. I truly think it might be more humble to admit that there are some things we can't know for certain. Maybe hope and faith are more real and more beautiful than certainties anyway. I am allowing myself to lose faith in the formulas ... in the dogma. Without losing my faith that there is More.

Perhaps it is the day to day that matters. Perhaps relentless seeking, not absolute truths, is what allows us to glimpse what is sacred. And what can inspire us to live more fully in the now.

Just perhaps. I guess I can't be certain.