In all honesty, I did not write this essay specifically for the purpose of this blog, but rather to enter in Iowa State University's First Amendment Day Essay Contest. As a disclaimer, as comes with any real piece of writing that I show to people, let alone be on a public forum, I would like to say that I wrote this quite quickly. In addition, I'm not so sure if I was supposed to write more about journalism and the relation to the First Amendment, but here's what I came up with, so I hope that you enjoy:
I hate Christianity for the same reason that I hate chemistry--there is nothing to see. It bothers me that I will never be able to watch a spirit rise to the heavens or examine a photograph of God, just as I could never see a test tube close enough to witness the breaking of Sodium chloride molecules.
It was not always like this though: for the first seven years of my life, in fact, I was a textbook Sunday Christian. Seven ‘Amen’s, nine hymns, 76 kneel-sit combinations each week, and I could guiltlessly forget about the Lord. But as time passed, homes were shuffled, a quarter of the country was crossed in my dad’s effort to find an adequately-paying job, and the issue of religion essentially fell by the wayside.
While it is evident to me now that my parents never really expected me to develop my own radical beliefs, it was not quite as obvious then. With the absence of church, I began spending my Sunday mornings contemplating who and what God was, instead of singing blind praises to Him. And in time I came to realize something about myself: I value the tangible; His abstract notion wasn’t enough for me.
Some may call this a character flaw: the inability to believe in ideals that cannot be seen, however, the idea that I can challenge popular religious beliefs without persecution is supposed to be what our nation was founded on. After all, the First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Nobody, the government says, should be able to dominate my spiritual values.
However, there is no doubt in my mind that if my parents had continued forcing me to attend church through my teen years, I would have become a begrudging member of the Christian community. A blessing in disguise though, they never resumed attendance; the inadvertent absence of religious guidance in my young life has been, in my opinion, one of the greatest contributions to the development of my character.
While I would honestly like to say that my parents abandoned my religious education to enlighten me upon the ethics of the First Amendment (and certainly this would have made for a more powerful piece of wiring,) I cannot. My mother still truly believes that I am headed for Hell and my father doesn’t discuss the subject. However, I can see that deep down they are proud of me for forming my own opinions, no matter how different they may wish they were. Their willingness to do so is a testament to the power of the first Constitutional appendage. This acceptance is all I could ask for.
And this influence is not limited to my parents; it affects every citizen of this nation. Only in America, I am prompted to think, could I be challenged by the government to live by my own philosophies, not just those preordained by previous generations. Only in this land is every citizen promised not only the freedom to form their own theocratic ideas, but the ability to voice them in their own words, by their own means.
Only here can I openly ponder the existence of God, Heaven and acetic acid at the same time, and understand nothing--with the chemistry grade to prove it.
It was not always like this though: for the first seven years of my life, in fact, I was a textbook Sunday Christian. Seven ‘Amen’s, nine hymns, 76 kneel-sit combinations each week, and I could guiltlessly forget about the Lord. But as time passed, homes were shuffled, a quarter of the country was crossed in my dad’s effort to find an adequately-paying job, and the issue of religion essentially fell by the wayside.
While it is evident to me now that my parents never really expected me to develop my own radical beliefs, it was not quite as obvious then. With the absence of church, I began spending my Sunday mornings contemplating who and what God was, instead of singing blind praises to Him. And in time I came to realize something about myself: I value the tangible; His abstract notion wasn’t enough for me.
Some may call this a character flaw: the inability to believe in ideals that cannot be seen, however, the idea that I can challenge popular religious beliefs without persecution is supposed to be what our nation was founded on. After all, the First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Nobody, the government says, should be able to dominate my spiritual values.
However, there is no doubt in my mind that if my parents had continued forcing me to attend church through my teen years, I would have become a begrudging member of the Christian community. A blessing in disguise though, they never resumed attendance; the inadvertent absence of religious guidance in my young life has been, in my opinion, one of the greatest contributions to the development of my character.
While I would honestly like to say that my parents abandoned my religious education to enlighten me upon the ethics of the First Amendment (and certainly this would have made for a more powerful piece of wiring,) I cannot. My mother still truly believes that I am headed for Hell and my father doesn’t discuss the subject. However, I can see that deep down they are proud of me for forming my own opinions, no matter how different they may wish they were. Their willingness to do so is a testament to the power of the first Constitutional appendage. This acceptance is all I could ask for.
And this influence is not limited to my parents; it affects every citizen of this nation. Only in America, I am prompted to think, could I be challenged by the government to live by my own philosophies, not just those preordained by previous generations. Only in this land is every citizen promised not only the freedom to form their own theocratic ideas, but the ability to voice them in their own words, by their own means.
Only here can I openly ponder the existence of God, Heaven and acetic acid at the same time, and understand nothing--with the chemistry grade to prove it.
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