To fill the aching void between Christmas and New Year's Eve hangovers, here's someone (recently late and widely lamented) writing with wit and insight into a state more people than we might imagine find themselves in.
"I am a reluctant Christian. I was once interviewed by Lynn Barber and I told her I was a Christian but not a homosexual . . . she didn’t believe either. “You can’t be a Christian,” she said, in her parlour maid’s voice, “you just can’t.” Well I can, that’s the thing with religion. Absolutely anyone can. “But you’re not remotely Christian,” she continued. “It’s another contrarian affectation.” What, like bow ties? “Yes.”
"I wish it were. Having a dose of religion, in my milieu, at
this time, is as awkward and inconvenient as not having it in 17th-century
Norwich. It would be so much more socially easy to be a vain fashion atheist.
"I was brought up by atheists. I honestly thought I was
immune to religiosity. And I didn’t catch it in a Methodist way after signing
the pledge, I began to have vague spiritual unease because of art at the Slade
and that really was contrarian. I’d go and sit in the back of churches and feel
wordlessly moved.
"There was a family friend, an Irish Jesuit and university
professor, who occasionally took me out to lunch and I would confide in him. He
was a radical libertarian theologist, which was exciting, and he said if at all
possible religion was something to be avoided.
Who would willingly lumber themselves with a book full of
medieval rules, superstitions and the possibility of an eternity’s agony by
choice? Far better, he said, to adopt a general humanitarian goodness, be
thoughtful, charitable and kind and trust in the benevolence of providence to
see you all right. He pointed out that, statistically, religious belief had no
actuarial benefits: you didn’t get to live longer, or have less cancer;
religious people didn’t have prettier spouses, politer children, more sex —
quite possibly less sex — nicer offices or better weather. They did, on the
other hand, get guilt (point of order here: it’s the Catholics and Jews who get
guilt, Protestants and Muslims get shame). And of course remorse.
"You don’t really believe that, do you, I said. “Adrian, I
wish to God I did, but I can’t because the space is already filled with a
belief in God.” I think I’ve got it too, I said. “Which flavour are you?” Well,
that’s rather the thing, I’ve got a formless faith.
He said: “If you want my advice, go with what’s closest to
home. Faith is ethereal, the practice of faith is cultural. If you become a
Zoroastrian or a follower of Cao Dai, a marvellous Vietnamese Christianity that
believes Muhammed, Moses, Louis Pasteur, Shakespeare, Lenin and Victor Hugo are
all saints, then you’re going to have to learn a lot of stuff . . . and get
over a whole lot of other stuff before you get to the good stuff and it’ll have
very little to do with your soul.
"“Weren’t you baptised into the Church of Scotland? I’d stick
with Protestantism. Actually, I think it rather suits you . . . low to middle.
Anglo-Catholicism would bring out the worst in you, all the dressing-up would
get out of control and you’d become an architectural pedant doing brass
rubbing.”
"So that’s essentially what I am — a lazy, middle-range
Protestant with a mildly pedantic crush on the King James Version and the Book
of Common Prayer."
with thanks to Weeping Cross' blog "The Hearth of Mopsus"
http://hearthofmopsus.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/no-blinding-light-to-be-had-anywhere.html
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