This post is one in a string of essays about spirituality. It may make sense to start with the first entry in the series.

Cornerstone Boston Public Library

I’m going to bullet-point the principles upon which I believe a realistic faith in ‘God’ can be constructed. Future posts will dissect the items one by one, so that they will make sense individually. Then I’ll put the whole list together in a final entry or two.

In a way, I need to apologize for this project. It serves me at least as much as anyone else. My entire being craves faith. My life has spun into directions I never anticipated or wanted. Who’d have ‘thunk’ that I would find myself at age fifty-one with no career? With damage to my body I can barely accept? With a string of psychiatric diagnoses, and perpetual severe mood swings? Life does not make sense to me right now, and I feel very far away from everyone around me, all those people I see working and living normal lives. If only there were some universal spirit that connected me to the rest of the human race. My material connections and my interpersonal contacts do not suffice to make me feel a part of things. I need something like ‘God.’

So the list below runs through my thinking out of necessity. Before working to build a more effective belief system, I had to ask whether the ‘higher power’ Alcoholics Anonymous directs everyone toward stands any chance of being real. Or is it just a comforting fantasy? I have spent too much of my life studying biology and physics to just toss all reason aside and embrace nonsense. Add to that all the suffering in the world. It intrudes in my own life, has devastated my family, wrecked the peace of many of my former patients, and floods the news. If there is a ‘God,’ it has to be one that takes the long view. It evidently sees individual humans as passing creatures who may be miraculous, but who must fend for themselves.

In order to build a belief in a higher power, I have focused on the truths below. It takes a bit of finesse, but with the proper perspective one can use these statements to bolster one’s search for a consciousness that connects us all. One can feel safe that one’s quest for a universal mind is neither deluded nor doomed. At the end of my string of discussions of the elements of my list, I’ll spend some time looking at the constraints science and reality put on this putative consciousness. I’ve already mentioned one: this entity leaves us mostly on our own in our struggle to survive. We may find moral support, but we cannot hope to discover a divine hand that moves hardship and tragedy out of our path.

The following facts act as keys that open my mind to faith, despite my materialist upbringing and skeptical nature:

  • Faith works. Quite possibly, when people pray or ‘turn their lives over’ to a higher power they are really just setting their ego aside. The act of faith (and faith must be active to be effective) allows instinct, intuition, and deep parts of the mind to step into the fray. They are often more competent when it comes to making choices than the narrow, materialistic ego. But I also believe it is possible that these deeper strains of thought reach further, and connect with some kind of universal consciousness. More on that later.

  • The experience of God is real. Even if there is nothing on earth besides matter and physical energy, people throughout history have seen, felt, and heard things that convinced them God exists. It is undeniably possible that these are just neurological phenomena, but they do occur. And they change lives. For instance, such ‘visions’ set me on a ten year quest that currently manifests as this series of blog entries that aim to open faith to resistant minds. (Note I am not trying to open minds to faith; that’s up to you.

  • Serendipity happens. Anyone who is the slightest bit open to the possibility of significant coincidences knows this. Perhaps at some point I will list some of my own experiences. It would be even better if readers would leave theirs. I’d love to build a page out of the odd alignments of circumstances that so often arise at just the right moment. Of course, there is a pretty good possibility they mean nothing. One can take the stance that there is no spiritual force underlying these events, and they just happen out of pure and unaided chance. But it would be inaccurate to argue they do not occur.

  • Consciousness has effects beyond the brain. This truth manifests at truly tiny scales, i.e., in the realm of quantum mechanics. But physical theory implicates conscious observation as having effects on matter/energy. Although the conclusion that this opens a door for mysticism is vehemently debated by materialists, the burden of proof lies with them. The theory itself does nothing to help atheists prove the absence of spiritual influences.

  • All things are connected. The experimentally proven principle of ‘entanglement’ shows that particles that were once in close contact with one another continue to behave as if connected under certain circumstances. The influences are exerted instantaneously, and do not depend on transfer of energy. Since the entire universe arose from an entity much smaller than an atomic nucleus, this means everything is connected. Note how this sounds a lot like a basic tenet of many spiritual philosophies.

  • Knowledge has limits. On small scales, there are limits to how accurately ‘reality’ can be seen. Beyond a certain precision, what is ‘real’ becomes fuzzy. Uncertainty forms the roots of the universe. Rigid beliefs are misguided, whether it is dogmatic faith or convinced atheism.

  • Reality is stranger than we think. As just one example, time behaves strangely when things move fast, and our day-to-day experience of it is deceiving. Only our ego’s arrogance permits belief that we really understand our surroundings. The humble stance is to remain open to mystery.

  • Life is a miracle. Some religions stand on miracles. These institutions turn to miracles for legitimacy. If miracles can support faith, then the fact that life exists may suffice. I do not suggest evolution was not driven by random events, nor do I postulate a conscious creator-God. But if we open our hearts to the vast mystery of creation, we are halfway to a spiritual sensibility.

Putting all these together, and also a few minor corollaries, gives me a sense that belief in a universal consciousness is not silly and misguided. It may be mistaken, but there are reasons to hope it is not. I’ll work my way through these reasons as I continue this theme in coming days.

***Click here for the next entry in this series.

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