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“Doubt does not in itself signify lack of faith. It may mean the opposite–that our faith is alive and growing.” – Bishop Kallistos Ware

Austin Sill | Guest Writer

The most salient feature of my experience at APU is that it has been marked by so much doubt. I have found this is to be a common struggle for APU students. Many of us entered into this academy having been raised in specific traditions and churches which have, as long as we’ve known, sought to maintain a sense of security and certainty in our so-called “faith journey.”

Thus, after studying
church history, theology
and Christian living in
a more analytical sense,
free from the biases of
our denomination and
from the watchful eyes
of our preachers, we are
struck with the despondent realization that
many of our deeply held
beliefs are more like assumptions, and all that we were once sure of may not, in fact, be the whole truth.

While studying abroad in Oxford, I happened upon a book by philosopher and author Peter Rollins called insurrection. I had, for some time, felt the first stir- rings of uncertainty. Having been raised in evangelical culture my whole life, I was beginning to question the establishment and the systematic approaches toward theology and Christian living. I was growing weary of formulas for a good Christian life and apologetics which sought to prove a God we confess to be unfathomable. I was standing at the edge of a cliff of doubt, and Rollins gave me a push.

The plummet led to darkness. It was wretched and terrifying. All I had known was being put under question. I fell deeper and deeper into this pit of existential angst, just waiting to hit the bottom so I could crawl out of this desolate stage of doubt. Then it hit me, I had not entered another “stage”; this was not a “season of faith,” rather I was undergoing an intensely deep transformation. I realized that I would never reach the end of this trench of mystery, for the pit had no end. It was God.

The plunge into the mystery of God introduced me to a remarkably life-changing view of doubt. In his book, Rollins argues that belief is a basic human condition. Look around you — everyone wants to believe. There are, according to Adherants.com, around 4,200 religions in the world. The Pew Research Center for the Study of Global Christianity found that there are approximately 41,000 different Christian denominations, not to mention the less-recognized religious followings such as the Powerball lottery (with the current catchphrase, “believe in something bigger”).

Belief is fashioned in our search for meaning. It is a self-centered endeavor. Yes, you heard me right. Your belief in God, my belief in God, is largely self-centered. It offers us a sense of security, belonging, certainty and comfort. Why else do we become so obsessed with a desire to “feel God” or to “be fed” in our spiritual walks. We expect something to come out of our belief. We don’t go to church to bring something to God; we go in hopes that God will give something to us, be it a feeling, a friend or a sense of purpose.

Doubt, on the other hand, is divine. In my understanding, doubt within Christianity can be defined loosely in two major ways: as a sense of intellectual uncertainty applied to theology and as the felt absence of God. This doubt, though somewhat irksome, has the potential to bring us to a deeper understanding of God, and further, to bring us to the center of the crucified life where we can heed the command, “take up your cross daily.”

This uncertainty, when applied to theology, is not intellectual weakness. Rather, it is an act of worship. As my journey progressed, I was led into the heart of a tradition that is continuing to help me understand this: Eastern Orthodoxy which teaches that the fullest understanding of God is found in the depths of mystery and darkness – in unknowing. One of the church fathers, St. Gregory of Nyssa, writes, “Emptied of all knowledge, man is joined with the highest part of himself…with the One who is altogether unknowable; and in knowing nothing, he knows in a manner which surpasses understanding.”

Doubt also brings us into the heart of the crucifixion. When we recognize and embrace the felt absence of God, we take part in one of the most sacred moments of history. W e take on the cross with Christ and with him we cry, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” This may seem like a hopeless theology, but have faith, for there is hope in the resurrection.

Faith is the answer to doubt. If we run from doubt, we run from faith. Enter into the cloud of God’s mystery with fear and trembling, have faith and you just might come to find, that within God’s darkness, in fear can trust be found. Yet remember, as Flannery O’Connor puts it, “Don’t expect faith to clear things up for you. It’s trust, not certainty…”