I had a very nice lady in Oz say to me today that she thought all religions were manmade and it was all a big conspiracy to control folk.
To her credit, when I actualy explained what my faith meant, she came back and said she thought that was really cool, so I will put that bit at the end of this piece.
Do folk really think that the Jewish and Christian religions are manmade and controlled in some way by humanity?
That really is beyond me and the reason is quite simple.
The Jewish religion, which commences with God showing up in person and then interacting quite openly with the Jewish people (you'd suspect some of them might have at least said something) is ancient. It dates back at least 4000 years, possibly older. So the two faiths (which both acknowledge the same God - as does Islam) span a period of several thousand years.
They also cover a huge geographic area, indeed the entire World which includes hundreds of nations and billions of people.
Humanity can't even manage to keep the EU together let alone manage a conspiracy covering thousands of years, all the nations in the World and billions of people. Its impossible for it to be a conspiracy, you'd need God for that....
Now about my faith.
What I said to the lady today is the truth. My faith has its roots in the pure Christian message that formed the early church.
I believe in absolute equality - there are no gender differences - if other folk did like wise there wouldn't have been #metoo campaigns, president club issues or indeed any differance in men and womens pay. That is what the early church believed as it was relayed by the Celtic Christians.
They also believed in caring for our planet and conservation. Had the belief system been widespread then the chances of the problems we are having with plastics etc quite probably may never have occured.
They didn't believe in forcing people to believe in God. Faith is a gift from God, no human can give it, only God and so if someone doesn't believe then they are the neighbours God calls us to love as ourselves.
Being kind to other people is a given, and humble, if faith is truely a God given gift then it must be humbling to receive it.
So within that kindness seek to do good, look after the people who are worse off where we can and as best we can and seek always to promote peace.
That is my faith - it was a gift to me from God whom I see as a living force in my life and who interacts with my day. My days are not all sweet and smelling of roses and I make the same or more mistakes as all other living people.
I have to see myself as a servant, not a master but for me, whilst I never sought to have faith, it was truly thrust upon me against my will or expectation in 2012, once I found it (and God found me) it changed my life in the most amazing way.
I have gone from where I was, and had spent most of my life, to finding a life of true contentment.
You cannot place a value upon that - so if you do believe the conspiracy theories that do the rounds on the internet or some of the other rubbish folk state, good luck to you. My only wish is for you to have a great life but if you ever do find a call to explore faith or spirituality, let me know - its great being in contact with other contented folk ;o)