The Experience of Doubt
I have always struggled with doubt. I wish that belief and trust came easily to me, but they do not. I think the first time I was aware of my doubts about Christianity, I was nine years old, weeping to my parents that I didn't have a 'personal relationship with Jesus', that hallmark of Protestant salvation and goodness. As a young adult, I discovered Catholicism, then Orthodoxy, and learned to pray the prayers of the church, relieved that I didn't have to make it all up myself anymore. As a Seventh-day Adventist, I hated to pray. I didn't know how to go about addressing the Almighty. I was told to just talk to God as if He was a friend. Of course, God is a friend, but I didn't feel right chatting away about my crushes or worries about what classes to take. It felt stilted and forced. In college, a Catholic friend taught me how to pray the Rosary, and I loved it. I could simply relax into the prayers honed and polished by generations before me. Nev...