Don't touch my yin yang!

It has been a long time coming, and I have avoided the conversation all together until now, but I think it is finally time for me to breech the subject of my religion. Recently, we started our first accupressure class in massage school, which is largely based on the principles of Taoism - yin and yang. It got my mind wandering about life in general and how people work the fundamentals of religion into things that best support their way of life.

In a weird way, I think a person's religious beliefs say much more about the person than their political affiliation or race would. Faith is something we own, but religion is something (in most cases) we choose.

I grew up Southern Baptist in a rather small, Southern town located in the midst of a rural, swampy area of hard-working, middle class (or lower) Americans. I will venture to say, for them, they chose their faith through a religion based on their neighbors...their community. It was rare that any non-work related function didn't center around the church or happen with other church members. It was almost expected that you were to be at church on Wednesdays and Sundays. There was a level of expectation that you silently followed or you were otherwise excluded. Sort of like Club Med for poor Southern Baptists - just without the body scrubs, and with chicken bog instead of chicken fricassee.

When I moved to Germany as a student, my eyes opened wider than my sockets would allow. There, religion represented a group of people with similar faith beliefs. You found Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Muslims cohabitating. People were at church not by social force, but because there was a message. So, I began to listen to the messages. In this new world of enlightenment, I began to realize that to me, religion and my faith were far less about a man walking on water, or a bush burning on a mountainside. It was about taking care of yourself and others while respecting each other along the way. Religions just sliced it different ways.

Later on, when my parents died, I searched and searched for that "community" that my childhood church had offered me. I had no parents, no parental figures, and for the first time, I was very, very lonely. My church at the time never once lifted a receiver to reach out to me. My childhood church had long since abandoned me. It all finally clicked...

I gave the better part of my life singing, making music, giving money and generally supporting "church". The one and only time I needed an ear or a hug, that same "church" abandoned me. But two weeks later, I got a letter in the mail explaining my duty to tithe.

I'm sorry, but fuck you.

Ever since that day, I quit "church." I have restructured what "faith" means to me, and re-examined what I think started the whole mess we're in now. Do you really think Jesus wanted his body strung on crosses across big buildings all over the world, being exploited for donations to keep those same buildings open? Maybe so.

Maybe he just wanted us to hear what he had to say: Be nice. The rest, pretty much is what "religion" has told us we needed to know... The same religion that took my talent and money, abandoned me in my time of need, and then asked for more. Very Christian.

This post isn't to judge your religion, you faith or beliefs. I understand religion means something different to us all, and speaks to each of our needs differently. I just felt it necessary to reflect on how religion spoke (or didn't) to me.