Religion and personal tragedy

Arts & Sciences Religion & Spirituality
1

I think its fair to say everyone here has suffered some form of tragedy in one form or another. One could also argue that different people have a different threshold for what counts as a tragedy.

This ain’t one of those posts where I get all “woe is me/ I’ll show you mine if you show me yours”, but I’m interested in this.

When a tragedy strikes, people use that as a reason for proving there is no God because “Why would he strike down someone so kind and harmless?” i.e. they are looking to lay blame somewhere. Others take solace in the bottle and try to block out whatever happened. Now, other people take strength from their faith at those times and it seems to get stronger.
Why is that?

The religion thing in this case really baffles me.

2

There are comforting words in the Bible.

3

[quote=“Funk500”]Now, other people take strength from their faith at those times and it seems to get stronger.
Why is that?

The religion thing in this case really baffles me.[/quote]

Good question, and I wish I had a “right” answer for you, but truth is, I can’t explain how my faith got stronger. I guess I would have to say, it’s been evidence that has unfolded over time, the belief in prayer, and knowing that there is a God.

But a person who is positive thinker and doesn’t believe in a god could say the same thing.

4

I think it depends on what you expect. Most Christians don’t ask God for stuff. (Some do.) But the basic philosophy is ‘Thy will be done’. Help me get through this. Mysterious ways and all that. The thing that first struck me about Chinese religions was it’s emphasis on praying for good luck and money and stuff. I would think that the people who expect something for their devotion would be most likely to abandon the practice when things don’t go well.

5

I thought it all boiled down to:

The world may be screwed up and unjust, you may suffer tremendous pain and loss, but don’t feel too badly, you just don’t understand what’s going on, there’s a big guy out there who loves you, knows what he’s doing and everything makes perfect sense, you just don’t understand it, and in any event the important thing is that you’re going to live forever in total bliss eventually (and if your friend/family died, they’re already enjoying that bliss), so just hang in there.

Seems like a cop out to me, but if it comforts people to believe in such things maybe it’s not all bad after all.

6

[quote=“Funk500”]When a tragedy strikes, people use that as a reason for proving there is no God because “Why would he strike down someone so kind and harmless?” i.e. they are looking to lay blame somewhere. Others take solace in the bottle and try to block out whatever happened. Now, other people take strength from their faith at those times and it seems to get stronger.
Why is that? [/quote]
:idunno:
Maybe one (predictable) reaction is evolutionarily dangerous.
When physically challenged, our default reactions are fight, flight, and freeze.
When struck be tragedy, some people get angry, some fold and withdraw, some sink back in shock.
Be really odd if it were otherwise, wouldn’t it?

7

[quote=“Funk500”]other people take strength from their faith at those times and it seems to get stronger.
Why is that?
[/quote]

Without commenting on the veracity of the beliefs, but explaining the strengthening of faith purely from a psychological perspective: when you lose a loved one, you may experience an even greater need to believe in salvation, heaven, an afterlife or what have you – all ways to comfort yourself with the thought that what has happened to your loved one is not entirely bad, not horrifying, not mysterious. Fear of death is IMO the most powerful of the psychological forces driving afterlife and related religious beliefs, so it’s only natural that when you actually experience death close to you, the motivation to believe would strengthen. Thus, this particular form of tragedy is likely to strengthen one’s faith, as is the creeping approach of one’s own death as one ages.

8

IMNSHO

An illusion we all tend to share as ego-driven beings is that ‘I’ am experiencing this for the first time and it’s all about ‘Me’. Ancient texts give us a connection with the greater being. ‘We’ have all experienced this myriad times before if you take the ‘Me’ out of it . Hence, religion, tradition, addiction to ritual, faith in science, etc. The riddle of consciousness leads us into the traps of orthodoxy.

Life is a pain in the ass, but would you swap it for something else?

[quotes taken from ‘The alms of armchair philosophy’ Lamebridge University Press, 2009]

9

I lost my dad when I was 13. I was religious at the time. In truth, the religion wasn’t all that comforting. I mean, your dad’s gone and you can’t talk to him anymore. Even if you think he’s in some sort of heaven or something, the fact that he’s dead is just rotten and beyond comfort. The fact that “spirits are eternal” was small comfort to me.

What was nice was the social support system in place. I’ll never forget some of the guys who stepped in and helped a poor kid out in many ways that were pretty vital to my development.

Of course, there were also some nasty fucking people who surmised that my dad was evil and hence killed by God or some bullshit like that. One of them actually confronted me at my high school (she was a teacher there) and said that my because my dad wasn’t an active church member and a sinner, he was punished by God with an early death and would likely burn in hell. I was 14 then, but I didn’t believe her. I knew my dad was a good man, even if he didn’t meet with the saints on Sunday.

The folks I know who are religious range from seeing everything in life or death through their religious viewfinders to not really thinking much about the religious angle to tragedy. For the first group, religion is comforting in a time of tragedy because it minimizes the feeling of powerlessness.

10

My first child died at the age of two weeks. God or little Baby Jeebuz didn’t enter into it, then or now. Was I somehow “less comforted” by that? I sincerely doubt it.

11

My ‘personal philosophy’ towards that stuff is ‘Learn to suck it up while you’re still in your twenties because it ain’t like fewer people are going to start dying the older you get’.

Also some pseudo-Buddhist kaka about being still and noticing/accepting. Raging against the dying of the light is a waste of your reserves. Hurts? Well, it will. Thought you were pain/death immune?

12

Taking the pain is the key. By any means at hand. Not letting it linger or fester.
It’s hard when there’s a series of tragic events, but then it really does become even more of a matter of Keep On Keepin’ On!
Engage!

13

Or as the man says,
Drive on, It don’t mean nothin’
Drive on.

14

No theology is capable of making the world a safe or fair place. Several attempt to explain why it is the way it is (karma, evil spirits, educational experience, etc.), while a few try to explain it all away (maybe evil is an illusion?), or give us the old bait-n-switch (heaven). For those who find comfort in such things, I think it’s more likely to come from the social support and continuity of tradition, than the particulars of the theology.

15

[quote=“Funk500”]I think its fair to say everyone here has suffered some form of tragedy in one form or another. One could also argue that different people have a different threshold for what counts as a tragedy.

This ain’t one of those posts where I get all “woe is me/ I’ll show you mine if you show me yours”, but I’m interested in this.

When a tragedy strikes, people use that as a reason for proving there is no God because “Why would he strike down someone so kind and harmless?” i.e. they are looking to lay blame somewhere. Others take solace in the bottle and try to block out whatever happened. Now, other people take strength from their faith at those times and it seems to get stronger.
Why is that?

The religion thing in this case really baffles me.[/quote]

From what I have seen, it has a lot to do with stages of faith development. Fowler has done the most research on this and most of the research I have seen on it stems from his ideas and goes from there.

0-2 starts off similar to other stages of development.

Ages 3-7 is characterized more with later stages modes of thinking, which is ironic based on what we would normally think. There is a much more sense of God being a “presence” rather than a “man in the sky.” They’re mixed, but the way it is often described is in terms of a more abstract concept.

The Mythical-Literal stage is where there is a strong sense of justice and the gods are anthropomorphic. This is in grade school.

The next stage is one where many people are and it’s where we begin to see the answer to your question - the synthetic-conventional stage. This appears around the time of adolescence and it has a sort of conformist attitude with a struggle involved. The person is trying to conform to those who are important to them while at the same time trying to break away from that conformity and find his or her own beliefs. Many people settle in this stage. Many churches take this opportunity to create support groups for teens to help them understand their own values and identity. Some churches do a good job at helping teens grow - others tend to exploit this and provide teens with an “us vs. them” mentality. You’ll see this struggle come up often as people talk about how controlling religion is. There is a good chance those people got turned off to religion at this stage from a group that did not help them grow.

The next stage is the individual-reflective state. This is why some people become stronger in tragedy. The person here is moving beyond knowing himself in terms of how others view him while at the same time developing their own identity. It is important to note I’m speaking in terms of faith here. A person can form his or her own identity in many ways, but still be in stage 3 of identifying his or her own faith by how others are. So if a person is in stage 3 of faith, it does not mean they are still seeking out others’ views for conformity in other areas of their life.

A person faced with tragedy who is in stage 3 will usually have 2 different reactions, as you pointed out.
–Anger. This often happens when they look to their support group and tend to feel the answers are not satisfying. The person then begins to feel angry and often rejects the faith because the support is simply not there in the way it needs to be.

–Strength. If a person is ready to identify for themselves what these events mean and is ready to look past the group mentality and seek deeper, there is a good chance they will look at their faith on a more personal level.

If you think of it in terms of relationships, it is very similar. When a person has something bad happen in his or her life, relationships of other people are also tested. At the death of a loved one, many people get angry and reject any sort of consolation. Others need time to retreat and take some time away and reflect. Other people find strength in family and friends and those relationships come stronger.

It all depends on how the person will react, how they view their faith, where they are in the development, and the chosen reaction to it.

That’s my thoughts, at least.