Have a little Faith

This semester, along with the normal load of accounting classes I'm auditing a Religious Studies seminar called "The Dynamics of Faith". Don't worry, I'm not that much of an over-achiever. I was roped into this, and partially out of my own pride and partially out of curiosity I don't want to back out now.

The professor taught both of my parents when they were students here and he's already made it clear that embarrassing me is on his top list of things to do in his last year teaching. He's a sassy one. Very dry/sarcastic and you, no matter how perceptive you may be, can fully read him nor predict where he's going next. His personality is both elusive and intriguing and makes the class a heart attack and a half.

The first assignment was to write about "what concerns you about Faith?"

Aside from the fact that this question is very vague and can be interpreted in many different ways, it sparked some interesting conversation this week. Hot topics of my paper were:

• The historical use of faith to create boundaries and barriers between people of different genders, races, ethnic groups, etc.
• The use religion, masqueraded as faith, as a means to gain personal power
• Self-centered faith. (God bless America for example)
• "one-size-fits-all" faith.

and then things get more personal, some things discussed among students that are also in the class:

• the fear of becoming comfortable and stagnant in my faith
• the fear that my definition of faith isn't the same as God's definition and therefore that I lack faith.
• fear of loosing my faith
• the degree of faith we put in material things, relationships, etc. ---what's acceptable, what's not?

Good questions, great conversation. So I pose to you--what concerns you about faith?