Keep the Faith

Faith is a word used in two major ways. The first is the idea of belief in the unseen. The second way is synonymous with religion. No matter how you use it, it always has the feeling of believing in something without doubt. This idea of faith goes beyond religion.

During the Age of Reason, many wise (yet, boring) philosophers spent their lives trying to understand truth. They wanted to logically create models for truth that could not be torn apart. One of the ideas that came out of this age is "cogito ergo sum: I think, therefore I am."

Cogito ergo sum is a doctrine of philosophy that goes a little something like this.

I cannot prove anything. I must doubt all that I experience. Everything that is happening to me could be an illusion, and I would have no way to argue that it is not. I must doubt everything. I doubt my sight, I doubt my feelings. Finally, when it comes down to it, all that is left is that I am thinking. When I doubt that I am thinking, I am still thinking. I am a thinking thing. I know that is truth.

With that philosophy, everything else in this universe is built on faith. I have the faith that my senses are not picking up an illusion, and my surroundings are real. Right now, I have the faith that I am at a computer, typing away and watching the letters appear on the screen. I do not know it for sure, but I do have the faith that it is happening. You have the faith that you are reading this. Now that you have faith that your senses are experiencing reality, you must have the faith that the information you are receiving is true.

All of history is believed on faith. None of us were there when Julius Caesar was assassinated, but we believe it without doubt, because we have faith in history. We have no choice but to believe it. Even scientific data must be believed by faith. Some of us have the faith to believe that we as humans are putting enough carbon dioxide into the air to melt the polar ice caps. Others (like myself) would first believe in the abominable snowman before accepting that bologna.

When someone says that you can only have faith that Jesus Christ rose again from the grave, make sure they understand that you have to have faith to believe anything. For reality itself is not simply accepted as truth without going through the soul's filter of faith.