I come from an interesting religious background. My mother is a "non-practicing" Protestant. My grandmother is a die-hard Catholic. My grandfather was a Buddhist, and my father is an avowed atheist. I come from a very tolerant background when it comes to religion. I made friends with Catholics, Jews and Muslims, seeing no distinction at all.
To me, religion wasn't about praying or reading the Bible. When I think of religion, I think of hikes to Buddhist temples in the mountains with my grandfather. I remember Sunday schools and goofing around with my friends. I remember my grandmother waking me up during a boring sermon in her church.
I never really took religion all that seriously. I used to joke with my Jewish friends about converting to Judaism and becoming one of the few Asian Jews in the world. One of my Jewish friends told me that all I had to do was ask the Rabbi three times and he couldn't refuse my wish to convert on the third time.
When I asked my Muslim friend why she had to cover her head, she told me that her people think of the hair as an erogenous zone. I laughed, and she scolded me. I used to kid about becoming a Pope and discussed its feasibility with my Catholic friends.
I am agnostic. Logically, I can't prove or disprove the existence of a God so I remain uncertain. I couldn't make myself believe in stuff in the Bible. I read about the God in the Old Testament and thought to myself that God is cruel and unjust. I noticed so many incongruities in the Bible that the text lost all of its credibility. I read about the Babylonian Captivity and the Great Schism, and I laughed at the Church at that period. When I was little, I went to a Holocaust museum in L.A. I saw deaths of innocents and believed that there is no God, because the God of Christianity or any other religion could not have allowed this.
Sometimes I wonder what it would be like if the Roman Catholic Church sold all of its wealth, and other religious establishments would sell their churches and land and make a donation to the poor and the needy. I read about the large wealth of the Mormon Church and the billions of dollars in wealth of the Catholic Church. Imagine what the money would do for people. All of people would be fed, housed, vaccinated and educated. No longer would people believe in a mysterious all-powerful being but in themselves. So what if they are "spiritually troubled" by lack of religion?
It's a frustrating situation to sit on the fence, not knowing and not being able to make the leap of faith. That does not mean I don't pray when I'm in need of divine help or read the Bible. I envy those people who believe their salvation in the end will be confirmed.
I don't like to believe that when we die, we just disappear. I want to believe otherwise, but I can't. There is no proof. A friend of mine thinks heaven must be very dull, because everything is white, and everybody there is nice and good. He asked -- "just look at people who capture our attention these days. Do you think they belong in heaven?" He asked me if I would rather meet Bill Clinton in hell or a minister in heaven?
There was an interesting article in the Weekend Gazette recently. It was about Christianity and Dartmouth College. I was surprised to learn that there were about 20 different religious groups on campus. I was more surprised to learn various quotes from Dartmouth presidents explaining how Dartmouth was "founded for the Christianization of its students." I laugh at the quote that read, "the Christian Spirit is eminently conducive to intellectual achievement."
I read about the Jewish Center opening, and the College forbidding certain Christmas carols during the Tree-Lighting Ceremony. My advice to the College is: don't interfere unless it violates or interferes with the rights of others.
They say as you get older, the more religious you get. I am only 19 years old. I have nothing but admiration for the moral standards that Christianity sets, because I subscribe to it and grew up with Christian morals. I admire those who can drag themselves out of bed on Sundays to go to church. I've always said that my mind is my own church. It appeals to my lazy side.
Some guy with a giant cross came up to me at UCLA and kept telling me he would save me from hell and gave me a Bible. I thanked him for the warning.
I say it's your choice if you want to wait for the Second Coming. I'd rather sleep. I'm sure someone will wake me up.
