This I Believe

At the end of my sophomore year in high school, we had an awards ceremony to honor those students that achieved the highest grades in various subjects. There were plaques for excellence in chemistry, biology, algebra and even physical education. I received the award for excellence in religious studies.

This was a curious award for me to receive, because I knew I didn’t have the best grade point average. There were students who had gotten 100′s on every test, always did their homework on time and certainly had a better attendance record than I did. Those students knew it, too. While I never formally discussed it with Brother Tony, my religion teacher that year, I like to think I know why I received it: I questioned everything. When you’re studying religion at an all-boys Catholic high school run by DeLaSalle Christian Brothers, it’s not easy to raise your hand and challenge Catholic doctrine, but I couldn’t help it. Barely sixteen, I didn’t understand why you couldn’t have sex outside of marriage, or use birth control or have an abortion. Or why homosexuality was a sin. I knew men and women that were married that didn’t love each other at all. Why should they get to have sex? I knew children whose parents treated them like they wished they’d never had them in the first place. And if two men were attracted to each other and found love, well then who was I to judge?

While it’s easy to assume I was merely a horny, contrarian teenager, I assure you I was not. I just desperately wanted to know. I wanted to understand and challenge everything that made up the faith I was born into. If that meant going head-to-head with Brother Tony on a daily basis, so be it. I even handed in an end-of-the-year essay on Bertrand Russell’s book, “Why I Am Not a Christian,” just to give him a final nudge.

In the end, it was worth it. Receiving that award was a turning point in my young life. I learned that it was okay to question my faith, my relationship with God, and ultimately, myself. It launched what can only be called a life in constant reassessment…that I live everyday. I learned that there isn’t much in life that is set; that doesn’t needed to be tended to or questioned; that is well enough alone. I believe that today I can look at myself, my world, my relationships and my faith and question, and tweak, and push and pull, and make them better and more alive. And I know that tomorrow I can do it again and there will still be things to assess and work to do. I’ll never be perfect. I’m still trying to find out who I am inside and what I believe. I may never get it right. Some days I succeed and get closer to the truth. Others I fail miserably and step back.

Either way, I know Brother Tony would be proud of me for trying.