Myths of Love, Peace, and Cynicism

I was a Christian for forty years, and depending on how I want to slice it I still might be. I stumbled on what became the obvious, however: that it was not true in the sense that I had been trained, and that the Bible had trained me, to require it to be. But the details of that are more numerous than the sands of the sea, and I do not think even Abraham's descendents and I could count them all.

But there is something still compelling about noble myths, and it would be heartwarming to be able to participate in something larger than the universe again. It would be nice to live in a divinely ordered, divinely contained world. How secure and wonderful to be so significant. I think that the need for such comfort is deeply rooted in the human psyche, and that is why myths of every sort, whether religious, environmental, nationalistic, egotistical, evolutionary, ad infinitum, will continue to be endemic to our species. I am not above it, either, for even during moments of debilitating cynicism I am therein taking comfort in a grand myth of understanding, of seeing through meaning itself, as though it were within my grasp.

I think we need to give ourselves a little leeway to take comfort in our myths. The sad part is, though, that our myths alienate us and put us in competition with people whose comfort lies in myths that are seemingly incompatible with our own. Our myths divide us, put us into clans, set us in competition, and put us at odds. Our myths, even peaceful and loving ones, are ultimately what justify our aggressions, our protectionisms, our hostilities. Our gods endorse us and condemn our competitors. Of course, we do not frame it that way: “I came not to condemn the world," for example. "He who rejects me is condemned already.” How gracious are our gods. How pitiful our enemies. Our frame wholly validates our de facto rejection of those who are alien and threatening to our zones of comfort and identity.

But we cannot afford to dwell on this darker side of our myths of peace and love, else we expose our in-groups of significance as terrifyingly bankrupt. At least on our better days the light that is in us is not too dark. And that is true of the people of any myth, even mine.