By all means, rid yourself of an impoverished faith

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

I ought to be writing my honors project, digging in to the dense theology of the Fathers, busting down silly arguments about priests as Icons of Christ. I really ought to be writing and analyzing and reading, reading, reading.

But I have trouble reaching into those beautiful images of Orthodoxy, have trouble grappling with Thomas Hopko and John Zizioulas when my faith is falling apart.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

I am taking a class on Eschatology right now that is shaking and crumbling the foundations of my Christianity. The problem is basically this: I cannot hold beliefs that I do not recognize as true and Christian eschatology requires me to believe that all will be made well in the world. I'm not sure this is true. I'm not at all sure that we Christians are not deluding ourselves into thinking that justice will come and good will triumph over evil. If anything, the history of the world has indicated time and time again that evil persists despite all attempts to eradicate it.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

I am concerned that Christianity is merely a structure that we map our needs onto, that all religions are like this. My concern is that religions function well for us but do not represent truth. Take Jurgen Moltmann for example. It's easy when you are a German who lived through World War II and all its atrocities to believe that hope and liberation are the essential elements of the world to come. This is precisely what you want to believe will occur. This theology of hope may represent the wishful thinking for how Moltmann would hope the world to be.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

We have this image of Christianity as something the Apostles passed down, that there is a line tracing back to the earliest Christians to today, no matter how twisted and bent that line may be. But this is not true, it's not true that there was one Christianity at any time. The Church has constantly fought against other churches within the midst. They have called these others heretics, but how do we know that they are? We have no reference to give that does not already presuppose our rightness in our biblical interpretation.

It matters to me what is true, whether I have good reason to believe it is a fact. This is not modernistic. I'm not searching for the monolithic answer, the one way of being. I'm just searching for something I can trust in.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

I have never encountered God. I did not have a conversion experience. I have not met Jesus. I have not seen lives changed that would not be changed by interacting with the practices of other moral systems of living, including my own.

So my faith is aching, groaning for answers. I'm trapped between historical and sociological problems and a Christianity that begs me to have hope that seems magical and wishful. I'm still praying, still pursuing a life of unceasing prayer, but I do not know how to persist in this faith, do not know what more to do than say my prayers and wrestle with these problems.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God...