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Who Am I?

I’m just about to return from a week in Belfast, hanging out with my buddy Pete Rollins at his ‘Wake’ festival. It’s been a week of discussion, drinking and debate, centring around the theme of the absurd. It’s given me a lot to think about, and I’m sure there’ll be plenty of posts on here over the next few months as I try to process everything I’ve learnt and experienced this week. Belfast has become a very special place to me, the city is rich with culture and history, with a vibrant music and comedy scene and an endless supply of pubs and bars to experience them in. The troubles in the late 20th century are still incredibly recent, and even though it’s nineteen years since the ‘Good Friday Agreement’, the city is still very much reeling from the events that took place.

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Atheism for Lent, A Year On

About a year ago, I gave up God for Lent. I joined with a few hundred others, scattered across the world, on a pilgrimage into what the mystics call the great Cloud of Unknowing on Peter Rollins’ ‘Atheism for Lent’ course. I find it quite ironic that the first time I’ve succeeded in giving up anything for Lent was in this endeavour, which is no doubt why it has taken me this long to start really talking about it.

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The Judas in Me

“Imagine if the worst thing you’ve ever done is the only thing you’re remembered for?”

That was the question presented to a packed tent on the first night of Greenbelt 2016 by Rev. Kate Bottley in a talk provocatively titled “Team Judas”. Kate shared with us the journey she went on while filming a documentary for the BBC earlier this year entitled “In the Footsteps of Judas”, discussing the life of the infamous disciple of Jesus that we remember only for the terrible, unforgivable betrayal that leads to Jesus’ crucifixion. A man who spent three years with Jesus, who was probably one of his best friends, that we know only for that one act of betrayal.

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Where is the Love?

The world feels like a pretty dark place right now. Brexit is happening, Donald Trump doesn’t seem to be going away, and I can’t turn on the news without hearing about another mass shooting or terror attack. The past couple of months I’ve seen more and more bigotry, racism, homophobia and sexism on social media from people I’m connected with than ever before. It has genuinely upset me, and I’ve struggled until now to write anything that I’ve been comfortable to post. Even today I’m not sure whether this will ever leave my increasingly growing collection of draft posts.

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Believing Again – A Testimony of Unbelief

When I was eighteen, I was preparing to get baptised, and part of the service included me sharing my testimony. The testimony of how I became a Christian, how God had changed my life, and why I was choosing to get baptised. The purpose of this was partly evangelistic, to share what had transformed my life in the hope it might lead to a similar transformation in somebody else. It was also really helpful for me as a self-reflection, to enable me to work out for myself exactly why I was making this decision, and to give me a written record to look back at in the future. I’ve blogged a lot recently about the ways my faith has changed and deconstructed. But I still get a lot of people asking me what happened. What caused my deconstruction, and the changes in my faith and beliefs? This post is an attempt to answer that question, a ‘Testimony of Unbelief’ if you like.

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Liminal

As I mentioned briefly in my previous post, last month I attended a festival in Belfast hosted by author and speaker Peter Rollins, entitled ‘Wake’. I didn’t know much about the event when I signed up, my friend had mentioned it to me saying she wished she could attend and on a whim I decided to sign up. The festival explored radical theology and was designed to mimic a wake, for us to mourn the death of God.

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Life After the Death of God

Whenever I had struggles in life, my faith was something I could cling to. When things got tough, praying about them made it easier. If I needed guidance, I could look to the Bible. When I asked God to help me make an important decision, I’d feel like I was being told what I needed to do. My faith was a comfort in times of need, a hope amongst the hopelessness, a light at the end of a very dark tunnel. No matter how shit life got, God was with me.

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Don’t Doubt

The story of ‘Doubting Thomas’ is often used to portray doubt as something that is wrong. We’re told that it is something we must fight against, Thomas is portrayed as somebody of weak faith and if we doubt, we need to strengthen our faith so we don’t become like him. Because nobody wants to be a doubting Thomas.

Well nobody except me.

You see, right now I can see a lot of myself in Thomas. I’ve been doubting a lot over the last couple of years, and it’s been a real struggle. But I’ve slowly come to realise that doubt and scepticism aren’t things I should avoid or run away from, but are in fact totally normal and should be embraced.

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Struggling to Sing

A huge part of church life, at least at the church I attend, involves singing. Every service or meeting we have involves some form of “worship”. Singing songs, usually with an acoustic guitar, about or to God. I used to love this, worship used to be my favourite thing to do. The songs filled my iPod, I played the drums in the band most weeks, and when I wasn’t I was in the front row of church with my hands raised high. Worship was a way I connected with God in a really intimate way, I loved it.

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Jesus the Atheist

For a few months now, I’ve been having huge doubts in my faith. If you’ve followed my blog at all during that time you’ll know all about it, I’ve been pretty open. Growing up in the Christian Faith, I’ve seen and encountered God in undeniable ways. I’ve felt the presence of God being with me, I’ve seen and experienced healing and miracles as a result of prayer, and I’ve seen people’s lives transformed when they’ve encountered God. However I’ve also experienced times when it has seemed like God is absent, times when my prayers have not been answered. These last few months I’ve experienced the latter. My faith has crumbled piece by piece and the God I once knew feels more absent than ever.

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