Most, if not all, of my posts about my college experience so far have been nothing but positive, and it is my sincere desire to keep it that way. As I further my experience as a writer, however, there are certain bothers that I experience and feel compelled to share with the world. Because, obviously, writers expect the entirely of the world to care what they have to rant about.
As I wrote in my former post, college has distilled in me an intense enthusiasm for learning. I could complain about my hours of homework and how I would rather watch Netflix in my pajamas than read a four hundred page poem in which I "don't really have to know what is going on, but should simply absorb the beauty of the language" (those liberal arts writing electives are pretty deep, eh?). But I am truly enjoying myself. And I actually use more of my current leisure time to read books of my own choosing than ever before.
This week I experienced something new that has really pulled at me on the inside. It's something I should have expected at a liberal arts school, and likely something I should overlook in the matter of being a good student and learning what I am taught on my own terms.
Religion is not taught as a belief system, but as a historical story nothing unlike war and socialization. A culture's worshiping of God is portrayed as a simple-minded thought in humanity, and not as what has created history in and of itself. Maybe it's just me and the fact that when I am taught about faith, I am taught in a church and learn the stories and beliefs that, in my mind, are true and worthy of living by. Religion to me is not a minute aspect of life, and as it has been for any religious peoples of the earth, it is something that consumes one's lifestyle because that is what we live for and is the reason we are here in the first place.
I am looked down upon by many for being a Christian and expressing my Christian views in the things I'm learning. It seems like to not believe is considered more educated because you have figured out how the universe and life was created scientifically, and that it is silly and childish to think that any majestic phenomenon of this "higher power" could have actually happened. As Christians, we indirectly incorporate Godly beliefs into everyday knowledge just as an atheist would incorporate his "realistic and practical" views into everything he experiences. But how is it fair that believing in Christ and a heavenly afterlife makes me less educated than you? How is it deemed respectable for you to think I'm ignorant just because you can study religion in a completely objectified manner and I cannot because I believe in a specific one? The Bible is history, and so is the Torah and philosophical books of nearly every other belief system.
We are looked down upon for believing in what they see as a magical supreme being, but how are they to know that it is anything short of real?
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