blackwire

FAITH

I imagine myself standing up...turning round and round, looking and searching and for the first time in my life, I begin to realise - just a little bit - the entirety and enormity of it. Its dynamic vibrancy, its neverending twists and turns, its pulsating power. Such is life, life is such.

In everything, there must be faith. Any faith. Whether in God, in science, in philosophy, all humanity needs something from which to orientate their lives from, even if we're not aware of it. That is the basic requirement of human life.

There are many who would deny this thing called faith. That is often because the word has been caught up too much in the human institution called the Church, nay, religion. Faith, for want of a better explanation, is not something that should be confined to religion, rather we should define faith as a subscription to a certain form of ideology, whether it is a civic ideology like socialism, Marxism, liberalism or a religion like Buddhism, Christianity or Islam. In this light, everyone is encompassed under the wide umbrella that orientates human life.

I have been brought up to believe in the Christian faith. My morals, my values, indeed the way I orientate my life are heavily influenced by Christian morality and values. However, apart from Christianity, other forces also influence my life and make up my orientation and they are the present-day social and civil ideologies. In short, I am a product of the society that we know of today.

At the same time, our society did not just pop out, like an anomaly on the page of history. Every society is anchored in its historical consciousness. Whether we like it or not, we could all probably trace a long line of cause and effect leading back to eternity. Even that explanation is inadequate. "Eternity" is just a convenient term to use to orientate ourselves in relation with the many many long winters of human history.

Whatever it may be however, to those who recognise this, the study of history becomes a search for the "Primal Force", the "Prime Mover", the "Alpha". Theories like the "Big Bang", "Creationism", even the bizarre "We are the spawns of an alien race" have been forwarded to explain our presence here on this earth. Why do we this? Because there is so much we do not understand about the present, about our lives. We cannot explain, fully, why our lives are orientated this way. IF there was this line of cause and effect leading back to the "First Cause" and that has made us into the way we are today, then WHAT WAS THERE BEFORE THIS "FIRST CAUSE"? The term "cause and effect" itself suggests a reaction. So what was there before this first reaction. In essence, the "First Cause" is the answer to everything.

As opposed to this "First Cause", many would argue that it could all have been random chance that made us the way we are today. Random Chance that led to human beings evolving from something, I know not what. I cannot refute this argument. Except that it scares me too much to fully contemplate this, because it takes away all meaning to life. It is as if in one fell stroke, everything that has ever happened was worthless, meaningless. It is as if were the world to end today, it really wouldn't matter at all. That, I cannot accept. Because if I do, I might as well end my life here and now.