Faith And Belief In A Secular Age

We live in a secular and scientific age. Many of us grow up without an important role for faith and belief in our lives, it seems, and we tend to struggle with the concept of religion. Can we truly have no faith or beliefs or is even the scientific worldview underpinned with them? Can we relate in a wise way to beliefs in a way in which our hesitations are honored?

Transcript

In these recorded reflections I want to talk about a topic that can be quite complicated to untangle for Western people. Myself included. I want to talk about faith. And I want to make some distinctions. Which I want to do from the background that my own practice, And I think as Westerners we often struggle with that sense of religion. We live in a very secular and scientific age and in a way this has become seen as the opposite of being religious. And in my experience, In my understanding, And in my own process, I've seen that there seem to be some knots to untie around different concepts, Different experiences. And I feel that getting a sense of clarity in this, We can make wiser decisions and we can understand better the context that we come from and the resistance and hesitation we might have in our own mind. The reflections that I want to share are born from my own process and my own observations around seeing the resistance that we have in the West and that I have seen in my own mind against religion. And then my current understanding of it is that what we might do from that resistance, That resistance is born from certain conditions and there is something to it. My understanding that if we can see that dogma is held in an unhelpful way, That it makes sense to be hesitant about that. But in my understanding, There is a clear case of throwing out a baby with the bathwater. That is one way to look at it at least. And what I mean is that, To my understanding, We always have faith in something. So when we think that we are non-religious we give up any sort of faith. But actually, To my understanding, And this has been very clarifying for myself in my own process, Is that we can see that also people that consider themselves secular or non-religious, There is still a system of belief, There is still a belief system there. And I will clarify that. Yet again, I do think it's always good to come back to seeing that there are reasons, And to a degree it makes sense, And we can maintain a degree of hesitation or carefulness around faith, Especially around dogma, And especially, I guess, Towards the way we hold things. But what I found myself very interesting as a thought experiment is to see the scientific model see the scientific worldview, Scientific materialistic worldview, Because they are so often connected, Even though they might not need to be ultimately. That science has become very much based on a materialistic worldview. And what has been very helpful for me is to recognize that also that is based on belief, It's based on faith. It's based on the belief that all there is to our experience is merely material. All that we experience is the body and things that we call mental experiences are just brain, Basically. And then what that entails is that also after this body passes away there would also not be any remainder. Nothing happens after that. That's the end. And this is normally considered the materialistic worldview. And one is, Of course, Free to hold that worldview or hold any worldview. It's just that one has to be clear in one's own mind that one is still making a choice. And I found this just very clarifying that this is also still based on belief, Based on faith. Yvonne holds strongly the belief that after death there is nothing there. That is still something that we have to take on faith, Even though we feel on some level that, Oh, I'm making the safe bet because I just connect to and conclude that whatever I can observe in this very moment is all that is there. And again, I found it just very interesting and helpful that to frame science or the scientific materialistic worldview as a form of religion as well. There's a belief system there, Things that we are not sure about that we take on faith. Has helped me a lot and it makes it also more difficult in a way because then we have to, In my understanding, Approach it in a way that what we do is, Instead of rebelling against all kinds of faith, We realize that we all do take things on faith anyway. We all have underlying assumptions, Even the most hard-headed secular non-religious modern people, They do have a faith system, They just don't call it like that. And it's also fine. There's no problem with it. The only thing is that we have to be clear in our own mind that we are making this choice. And it's interesting because then another principle comes to mind, Which I'm speaking a bit from a Buddhist perspective, But also in modern times this principle has been recognized. So there is Pascal, And he formulated Pascal's wager. And also in the Buddhist scriptures, Normally it's understood that the Buddha lived before Pascal. And he formulated the same, But just for the sake of relating more to our modern times, There's Pascal's wager. Postcalls, Wager, Forward aid stat. When when we consider whether there is life after death or not. Whether we believe, We take the faith that there is or there isn't. We might not be sure, But we have to consider, Let's say, If either one of them is true, Which one is most impactful? And then actually when we consider that there would be nothing after death, Then in a way there's also no problem. We can live our life in the best way we can and then it will end. But if indeed it turns out that there is rebirth, And I will make the case for evidence that is there that seems to suggest that there might be rebirth. Which is also a scientific endeavor to look at the evidence that is there. But if there is rebirth then that has much more implications because then life continues and the question is like how do we then relate to that? Let's say that after we pass away from this body we will be born again in a new body This is normally the understanding that comes from the teachings of the Buddha, That we can be born again as a human or as an animal. Or we can go to a higher realm, A heavenly realm. And it's interesting because even if we look at it from a very scientific point of view, We can see that there is a lot of evidence that suggests that this might be true. And in a way that is already enough if we consider that it might be true and it is more impactful. We have to really consider what do we take on faith. Again, Realizing that even if we believe there is nothing after death, That is a form of faith. In my personal process, What I've done is just investigate and see that there are so many stories, So many people that have had, For example, Near-death experiences where they had the experience of other places. Or experience in general that were not connected to the material body, But that could not be explained by just a psychological phenomena within the body, For example, Rising up from the body, Hovering over a hospital where one is almost dying. And just seeing certain things that cannot really be understood in a different way. There are so many of these cases that if you feel skeptical when I say this, That's also of course very much fine. But just when you start to investigate this, There are so many cases where it just seems reasonable. So near-death experiences, It's not an uncommon phenomenon that sometimes young children can still remember past lives. These memories tend to fade. And just reading these accounts, There are so many where it just seems very reasonable that that really happened in that way. And then, At least for me, That has been enough. Another thing that stands out is just to see that the way we are so similar to animals, And if we observe animals more clearly, It becomes quite obvious or quite reasonable that we would be reborn as an animal, Seeing their personalities and the way they are. Again, I'm not trying to convince you of anything, But for me, Like seeing these things, I realized that actually, If I need to take a pick, If I need to really make a choice for what kind of hypothesis or assumption do I take in my life? It just seemed that to take the assumption that there is rebirth or there might be rebirth, One, It has more impact. Because if it is true, It means that we need to take it serious. And I will explain more about that. But at the same time, Also just considering that, Yeah, Again, We take one or the other and we need to, In a way, Make a choice and consider what do we really have faith in. I think it really comes back to unpacking again like the resistance we have in the West towards religion and I guess in a way understandable. It seems that in the Western history things have happened where religion really took really misused certain aspects or components of faith, So enforcing dogma on people and enforcing things that are not in line with reality. And my understanding is that in the West there is, In some sorts, A cultural overreaction towards, Against faith, Any form of faith. Although it seems also that these things can change again. And then again, Like being wise about what do we have faith in and realize that no matter what we have faith in something. And so again, For me, This has been very terrifying. That we can recognize, Again, Also the scientific model as being based on faith and assumptions. And again, Just my main encouragement is to really look at that and to consider what kind of assumptions do you want to take and what are the implications of the assumptions that you choose as your, I would say, Hypotheses. And that is always the danger we have or the thing we need to be careful about if we have faith in something, To always recognize it as faith, Not something that we know. And again, This is something where people become dogmatic and people become more averse towards faith and religion. People that are very sure about things that they actually don't know. But of course, We can be quite confident or very confident. I would say quite confident, Most reasonably, About the things we take on faith, Like having thought it through. For me, For example, Just taking on faith that rebirth seems most likely. And also because it has a lot of implications that we need to take serious. Because if there's rebirth, Then would mean that we would continue in this experience that we are having and we all need to consider what are the implications of that and maybe I make another sharing about that. Because from Buddhism, The way the Buddha was teaching, He was pointing at that he would see his own lives from the past endless, Many, Many, So he could see so many lives that he lived before is what he shares, What is taught by him. And he said that that experience led him to see that it made it feel very impersonal because he could see that his personality might have changed over time. At some point he was like this and then he did those things. These things happened and he changed and he kept just kind of moving on from experience to experience. You could see the transience in that if we take our life personal but if we if we can experience again and again that this body passes away and that we move on to the next place. And maybe whatever aspect that we do take personal, Maybe our personality or certain aspects of our experience, They just keep completely getting away from us. We are on some kind of. Almost like on rails in momentum that's going on and actually the big step that the Buddha made it seems to be significant so he didn't only say that there is continued birth And there are more religions that state that, And for some people they considered, Okay, What is the problem? And then you just keep on being reborn. And I've spoken to people who said they don't want to be Buddhist because if they become Buddhist then they will have to be reborn again and again. But the understanding from the teachings of the Buddha is that it's not necessarily about what faith you choose, Like things are one way or the other. So you have to still choose your faith, Like what do I bet on, So to say, For lack of a better word. What the Buddha said is that it's not the only thing that you can see that there is rebirth but also that there is freedom possible from that by Penetrating with like actual understanding the way we also understand other things But this is a deep understanding of the nature of things not necessarily the content of things but just like a slow deepening of the realization how impersonal things are and just a fading away of that sense of identification with our body our mind or emotions or our thoughts, Whatever aspect of our experience, Even our consciousness, Even the experience of consciousness, Being aware of, In this case you're listening to what I'm saying, So there is There are things that you hear, Things that are present in the air, Maybe things that you hear, And just a general sense of mental presence, Like the mind is online. You are here is what it feels like. And the Buddha said that you can actually, With your actual experience, More and more penetrate that none of these things are really lasting. And on some level, I think many of us would accept that on a cognitive level. Although even in spiritual circles, It's always something that's still taken as mine. I am this consciousness or this global consciousness. But the Buddha seemed to have been revolutionary in stating not just from faith or ideas, But he claims to have fully penetrated and the thing is if you fully penetrate that, That constitutes freedom from any form of suffering and that's again an object of faith that the Buddha explained that only that leads to the stopping of the momentum behind being born again and again. Anyway, To go back to the starting point of these reflections, To really consider and to investigate what is our cultural background in the West, Seeing the Western psychological, Secular, Materialistic model and worldview. Just for me, Again, That's just been so helpful to see. Actually, It's also a belief, A system of belief. I guess when people say it's not religious, They mean that it's not dogmatic in a way, But Yeah, People, Secular, White scientific people can likewise be pretty dogmatic. I guess the idea is it's not based on anything that you cannot see. But my take is that you have to realize that still you take things on faith. You take on faith that after death there is nothing, Whatever that might mean for you. There is no continuation after death. And just to see that you cannot be sure about that. And my urging would be to investigate that and to consider what are the assumptions I want to take, Because we feel like we don't make a choice. We just choose to not have faith, But actually it's still a form of faith. I come from a Buddhist perspective because having investigated all of this I had the most faith It seems the most reasonable what the Buddha was teaching and so let me try to put that in practice But of course at least I want to trigger your thoughts about what kind of things do I take faith in? What is the impact of the culture that we've grown up in? And even in the West, It seems there is a kind of bouncing back where people do consider that, Oh yeah, There might be more than we can see here right now. And if it is really true, It might have a lot of impact. So we need to consider that seriously. And from the Buddhist perspective, That is very important. And again, It goes beyond just considering that there is birth again after death. It is also meaning that, At least as how the Buddha explained it, That freedom from any form of continuation and suffering can be found. So I leave that for your reflection. Not an easy topic, But for me, I found it a very helpful component, Important to figure out. And I will leave that for your reflection, And hereby we come to the end of this reflection. And I wish you all the best.