On Belief I

I am a member of Narcotics Anonymous. Being a member requires a certain about of faith: faith that the program works; faith in the people that you share things with; and faith in a higher power of your choice. Before I explore this a bit more, I wish to relate an experience I had that may be relevant.

Back around 1980, we (Marge, my then-wife, Jay, our son, and I) lived in North Minneapolis. Near us the Mormon missionaries rented an appartment. They work in pairs, of course. and every 6 months they change partners. One of the pair is the more experienced, the other the newer. The younger of this particular pair of missionaries was having difficulty. He was homesick. I don't know the details of the problem, but he was darn close to being sent home. That would have been a big disgrace to him and his family. It was to be avoided at all costs. This pair was kind of relieved of duty, the elder of the two was just asked to keep the younger going. They came to our house a lot and chatted with us. We got to know them pretty well.

(I was going to refer to them as the elder Elder and the younger Elder, but took pity on y'all. When a Mormon rises to the ranks such that they can become a missionary, they take the title of Elder. In practice, this title is just used for active missionaries. Their name tags say Elder Smith, Elder Jones, etc. You would be forgiven for thinking that a lot of Mormons are named "Elder".)

I got interested in what Mormonism was. They ended up giving me their pitch. They requested that I read the Book of Mormon and daily to pray about weather or not it was the word of god. I did that, too. Eventually, I decided that it was. I joined the church.

Marge was raised Catholic and was not interested in becoming Mormon. She had enough bad experiences as a Catholic that she never went to mass, but still believed enough that she couldn't leave.

Mormons have a three-hour Sunday morning meeting. There is an hour of Sunday School, and hour of priesthood meeting for the men, and then the hour of sacrament service which is the "normal" church service. While the men had their priesthood meeting there was a meeting for the women, but the name escapes me.

Marge resented my spending this time "doing what I wanted" while she was "stuck" at home with our 6-year old ADHD/LD son. She had me take Jay with me. Even with this there was still some resentment and friction. Eventually I stopped going to church for our relationship.

(There is more to tell about my life as a Mormon. That is for another time.)

So, what with the visiting Mormon missionaries, the people at church, daily scripture readings, and occassional meetings or activities during the week, I got a lot of social and doctrinal reinforcement. When I stopped attending church I no longer got that reinforcement, and in a few weeks my mind returned to "normal". I realized that I had been brainwashing myself. It was by my constant repetition of Mormon doctrine that I came to believe it. When I stopped that, my belief stopped.

I now am an atheist, but atheism is not my religion. I am sure that this is a reasoned decision, not based on social needs nor some form of indoctrination. I still have a fondness for Mormons, they are a good bunch of people. Their religion is 100% wrong, but they are OK.

As an NA member I need a higher power. No, as an addict I need a higher power. My higher power is the NA group. They have the knowledge and wisdom that I lack.

That is it for now. Until next time,

Tom