God?

My wife recently had her knee replacement replaced. It all went great surgery wise, but a few days later she fell while hobbling around with her walker. This tore the tendon that straightens out the knee. She literally had to physically lift the lower leg with her arms. She had to go back into the hospital for another surgery to repair the tendon.

Going to a hospital during this Covid 19 outbreak terrified her. She knew she might be exposed to someone who had the virus. In typical fashion for her, however, she was more afraid I would contract it and afraid for our children and grandchildren.

She is a religious women, a Christian. Not the wacko off the wall kind that are always in your face preaching about the end of world and a flat earth, but a genuine believer in the existence of God and the good news of the Bible kind of Christian. She is loving and selfless to a fault, especially for her family. She lives her faith instead of telling everyone they should join it.

This morning I found myself asking friends and relations for their prayers or whatever they do on behalf of my wife. This was odd, because I don't really believe such things have any bearing one way or another. I know my wife does, so I asked for her sake. While I used to share her beliefs, I can't say I do now. Lots of water has flowed under the bridge since then. I learned I had mental health issues and had to be put on medication. It took a lot of trial and error, but doctors figured out what combination worked with my particular illness. That changed everything.

One thing that not many people seem to talk about is how these various meds can, and will, affect your worldview. In my own experience it seems to allow you to perceive the world around you through a different set of lenses. You are not looking through the rose colored ones we are told we all wear somehow. Depending on the drug, it seems as if you are seeing everything with crystal clarity. You are more focused in some ways, more in the moment. It gets harder to cast aside reality, which I imagine is why really creative people don't like taking them. They leave your imagination somewhat dulled. Not that you can't imagine things. Its more like you can no longer immerse yourself in fantasies or daydreams. You see them for what they are.  It's like you lose your ability to pretend.

What I'm driving at, is that for me at least, spiritual things no longer seem "real". Christianity's Jesus, Wicca's God and Goddess, any and all divinities no longer make an impression on me. This may be because you learn very quickly that the chemicals in you brain can affect your perception. You begin to understand that a lot of internal and external influences can change how any given situation appears. That means that what you are experiencing may be all in your head, so to speak, and not actually the way things are. As Charles Dickens suggests in Scrooge, bad food can make you see things that are not there. Chemical influences can affect your powers to perceive reality. This is the reason certain drugs and other stimuli can make you experience things that aren't real.

There have been peer reviewed and duplicated experiments where researchers have stimulated various parts of the brain using pulses of electricity. By doing this they have been able to induce near death experiences, UFO abductions and a plethora of other phenomena folks normally attribute as paranormal. If such is the case, that suggests that people who see and talk with aliens, or angels, a god or a devil may not have actually done so. As far as they're concerned, it actually happened whereas somebody who is present at the time will see absolutely nothing out of the normal.

The short version is this. I am now painfully aware that perception is not always accurate. For me that means a conversation with God could be a delusion caused by something totally different, including my own imagination. You or I can accept an idea so strongly that it changes the way our mind works. I guess it sounds far fetched and makes us all seem delusional to some extent but that's what I think can actually happen. It's harsh, I suppose, to suggest that a persons faith could be some type of self induced delusion, but it does suggest that is a possibility.

The bottom line? I am no longer sure that God exists. I would like him or it or she to be real, but that does not make it so. I have no proof God exists, I have none that he doesn't. I know, it's that age old quandary non-believers always fall back on. I am not, however, trying to convince a fellow human one way or the other. I am debating with myself. I know all the arguments because I was taught them. I can use them on me. I suppose all of this makes me agnostic. Does God exist? I don't know. It's as simple as that.

At this point I know there may be readers who stumble upon these ramblings and say "Good for you!'
I know there are others that will try to change my mind and convince me that God is real and that he is here and I can have a personal relationship with him through Jesus. Eh../Sorry, but no. I know the four spiritual laws, yada, yada, yada. Remember, I once was on the other side of the debate. I don't accept that all of them are real any more than I accept Wicca's "As above, so below" or alien visitors or ghosts or any of the other whateverness people come up with on a daily, if not hourly, basis.

No, I am not miserable. I live a very joyful life despite that I've been told I can't without Jesus. I am also not afraid of dying, only of having to leave my loved ones to go on to who knows where, if at all. I am perfectly content to cross that bridge when I get to it. I no longer believe in the concepts of heaven or hell. There is death and nobody really knows if there's anything beyond that. You can tell me your sure that there is. I don't believe you are correct.

By the way, the operation went well and aside from not liking that cast they put on her leg, the wife is doing just fine. So far as I know at this point neither of us has been infected with the virus. I'm trusting in that God I'm not sure of to carry her through this. I hope I'm lucky enough to tag along.