Finding a New Faith

This is Jena, the author of our second entry on chapters 8 and 9, with her family, including husband Jesse and daughter Brianna. While reading Jena's thoughts on these chapters will be reward enough, you'll also be rewarded at the end with another picture of Brianna -- in angel wings! Happy reading! (Oh, and no, there is no special meaning to the text that's highlighted...I'm loading this from my laptop at home, and it's so old, the Word version isn't compatible with Jena's, and I just can't remove it!)

After reading chapters 8 and 9, there were many topics for possible discussion. I felt most intrigued by Suzanne’s comments about her positive views towards God. It brought up some personal issues that I have been through, being a Christian woman.

I consider myself a spiritual person. I was baptized and raised within the Lutheran- Christian faith. As a little girl, I participated in vacation bible school every summer, along with other activities our church provided. I graduated from Catechism school in the 8^th grade. There was a period of time during my high school years where I didn’t attend church, but as I became older and wanted to start a family, church became important to me again.

In 2006, I became pregnant with my daughter, Brianna. It was a ‘happy surprise’ for my husband and me. I felt guilty for not committing to church regularly, so I contacted the pastor of our church and began taking parenting classes. After our daughter was born, we decided to have her baptized. Before we were able to baptize Brianna, our family had to attend a few meetings with our pastor.

During these meetings, our pastor described how children were born as sinners until they are baptized. I found this a little disturbing because I don’t see it that way. I believe children are born innocent. How could a baby be born a sinner? What happens to the still-birth babies who don’t have a chance to be baptized? According to our church’s beliefs, babies are born sinners because they only think about themselves, through eating, sleeping and other basic needs they put before God. Once children are baptized, they are cleansed from all of their sins and are forgiven. We did baptize our daughter and were very grateful to our church for doing so, but that was the last time I attended the church -- the church I had grown up in to learn the word of God. I felt I was on a different path. I wanted to search for a place that shared views similar to mine. My attitude about my religion changed as I learned about the church’s beliefs of original sin.

In chapter eight, Suzanne and her daughter were having a discussion about what original sin was. While discussing this, Suzanne found an old Catechism book with a picture depicting original sin. It showed a picture of a child with a black spot on the child’s soul. Suzanne discusses her opinion on original sin and how she thinks it doesn’t exist. She doesn’t believe children were born as sinners. She wrote, “I believe that we start out marked by the love of God, not the sin of Adam” (p. 122). Suzanne’s thoughts about this are what caught my interest throughout these two chapters. I, too, would like to praise and learn more about the loving God I have grown up to believe in. I don’t believe that God would send a newborn child to hell if that child was not baptized in time.
I sometimes think of religion as being more political than spiritual. Maybe this is why I haven’t committed to going to church in awhile because I do not enjoy mixing political views with religion. People have different perceptions of what their religion is. Some of the discussions between these three women are fascinating to me because they all have different perspectives about their own cultures and beliefs. They also share their ideas on what they think other cultures value and believe in. It takes courage and an open-mind to accomplish what these women have shared in their faith club.