Funny how I am stuck in my fear of offending. The truth is everything is offensive to everyone, inside and outside of a faith. If I am a Christian, I am offensive outside, a liberal believer: offensive inside my denomination, kind: people are skeptical, mean: I will offend. I keep looking for a clue as to how I should behave, but this causes me to panic. What is the answer for me to live my evolving faith, outside of my circumstances (or my surrounding fellow evolvers)?
I'm told that in the 80's there was this multicultural movement that encouraged people to see the world in relative terms and let go of personal convictions. Therefore, if you have a belief or a sense of one way over another, you are considered behind the times, archaic. Another political initiative around religion is to replace "freedom of religion" with "freedom to worship," to keeping expressions of faith inside churches and outside of public spaces.
I know that the strong voices in the name of a faith often cloud the truth. A billion people's harsh actions in the name of Christ get stuck onto me if I say I believe in Jesus. People will assume i'm for extremism, for an angry cause, anti-everything, all without asking. But, how does one ask? How does one speak at all without pre-judging or being pre-judged? Do I post anonymously, avoid dialogue, hide my thoughts in layers of my personal diary?
I am struggling to know how to live my days. I want to live and love and be an individual in relationship with others in the world. I experience God as loving and real and for me. I pray I can be strong from that place. I pray that I can love and forgive and seek other's good.
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