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firmed” in the church. My memories are vague, but I recall that I was supposed to accept on faith the teachings and miracles as set forth in the scriptures. The teachings I had no problem with, but it troubled me to stand in church and recite the Apostles’ Creed, an oath of belief in certain supernatural things I found, in my deepest conscience, to be unbelievable.
When I asked our minister about these troubling thoughts, I was told that the answer is easy: one needs to have faith. Without faith, you cannot believe, and without belief, you cannot get into the kingdom of heaven. This man had a resonant and authoritative voice, and I was just a little kid, and this was a long time ago, so I did not question him further.
But I sensed a circular argument. I wondered, what is faith? Is it believing — or pretending to believe — something that is logically unbelievable? Sounded a lot like hypocrisy to me.
I did question my mother. I’m not sure how convinced she was of the existence of the kingdom of heaven, but she explained to me that all the best people in town went to our church, and I should just recite the litany and not think too much about what I was saying. Church was a good thing, everybody knows that, and it was in my best interest to attend.
What a terrible,' inconceivably wrong thing to try to teach a young
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