This Is What Religion Means To Me:

“Why are you scared to dream of God when it’s salvation that you want? You see star’s that are clear have been dead for years, but the idea just lives on.”

These are song lyrics by Bright Eyes, the greatest artist of all time. In my eyes he sums up religion perfectly. It isn’t about a person or a greater being (“God”), it’s about so much more. Religion isn’t about what you believe; it is about what that belief gives you. Religion is a state of mind that is enveloped with promises of hope, faith and “salvation”. When I say religion in this context I mean broadly speaking rather than just Christianity. All religions began from something, some event or series of events that caused people to believe in a higher being. These events (much like the stars) are long gone however the ideas which eventuated from them still “live on” through religion.

“’When I do wrong, I am with God’ she thought. ‘When I feel lost, I am not at all.’”

“God”, the greater being that many believe in is simply a catalyst for these beliefs of hope and salvation. It’s easy enough to say that things will get better if you are in a bit of a rut. It’s easy to tell yourself that things will be better and of course it’s easy to hope that things will get better. However it isn’t always easy to BELIEVE that things will get better, because often you can never see how it is possible - and as they say “seeing is believing”.

In order for change to occur someone or something needs to make it happen. Believing in a higher being is believing that something far greater than yourself has the ability and will to make this change happen. It gives people the chance to put their faith in something more concrete then just ‘hope’. Mere optimism is usually not enough for people to put their faith in, so “God” is ready and waiting to soak up everybody’s hopes and dreams and supposedly spew them back down on us in a form of some kind of ‘sign’. Hope goes up, faith comes down, and confidence in a better tomorrow is the result.

Personally I don’t believe in God. There is no ‘higher being’ that created everything and everyone. For those who would argue against that and say “Then how are we here? How did we come to be if not for God?” then my argument would not be the Big Bang Theory. The thing is nobody knows how or why we are here, and that is ok. I think it’s foolish to believe that we will ever know. We will never know everything (try as we might!), and there will always be things that amaze and confuse us – and you know what? That’s what makes life so God damn exciting.