Faith

I listened to Kwame Anthony Appiah’s talk on ‘Mistaken Identity’. The main point I think he was trying to get across was that religion or faith is more of a verb i.e. a practice, rather than a noun, or a category you pick. He says this is because of two main reasons. One: you cannot join a religion merely by studying and agreeing with the principles of it alone – so much of belonging to a religion is about being in community with others. I guess he means here both others of the same religion, with whom you do rituals of that religion, but also others in society in general, to whom you relate according to the guidelines of your faith. For example a Christian might be charitable to others, in line with the guidelines of the Bible. Two: Appiah talks about how, in practice people, lay people or people high up in the structures of organised religion, will always be interpreting the religious texts on some level, and those interpretations are often different to one another. So there is no ‘pure’ experience of religion, instead it’s always experienced through practice. The example of his father being a methodist Christian and following Ashanti rituals of pouring libations, and seeing no contradiction in this, whereas colonial missionaries might, is one example of this.

Personally, I used to be very religious (a practicing Catholic), and then left the church when i was about 18, during the uncovering of the extent of paedophillia in the church, and when the extent of homophobia in the church became clear. For me, these things that were being directly or indirectly sanctioned by the church were so wrong that it caused me to question my faith. Relating it to Appiah’s talk on faith, I would say that it was the ‘practice’ of Catholicism, as I saw it, that my focus was on, and that had disappointed me. I remember that the older adults I tried to discuss my reasoning with did not see the immoral practice of some Catholics as having a baring on their faith – their faith was based on the Bible. However, for me the link between the religious text, interpretation and practice is more fluid and interconnected than Appiah suggests, particularly when it is those who do the main interpreting of the religious text, the high up priests and cardinals, who are implicated in the bad practice.

That feels like a tangent perhaps – perhaps not to do with academic teaching, but each time I am asked to reflect on one of these topics, I find it deeply affecting and it brings up quite difficult memories. I found it quite interesting how in a lecture about faith, Appiah doesn’t really give us a sense into his own lived experience of belief and faith and practice, beyond telling us that he and his father hold what might seem to a Western audience, two different belief systems.

Bringing this back to academia and teaching, perhaps the reason Appiah doesn’t tell us what he actually believes, the reason I feel uncomfortable writing down my own story of faith briefly here, is that there is a silence, perhaps even censorship, around talking about faith in academia. This term, in my Writing as Performance class, I had a student who talked openly about her Christian faith and church camp, and it highlighted for me how rare it is for people to talk about their faith in class. I found it very refreshing and I even started to chime in on points of commonality and difference.

I wonder how I can continue to create a space in which those with religions can express themselves, and analyse the ideals that underpin how they move through the world, on an equal footing with those with more secular beliefs. How can we make sure there isn’t a silence around religion and how it informs creativity and who we are? How does religious practice or spiritual practice or belief, affect our creative practice?

In Shades of Noir ‘Terms of Reference’ on Faith, I read a report by Tiffany Webster on Social Justice, buddhism and queerness. This reminded me of the way that faith, such as buddhism has underpinned the thought and action of many radical black activists. I consider the work of the activists as creative acts as these individuals and groups have to imagine that there are other ways of being. This strengthens my feeling that there is a link between spirituality and faith and creativity, which is worth doing more work to uncover and allow to come through in the classroom. Similarly Raman Mundair’s description of their spiritual journey through practicing many religions and practices, from sikhism to buddhism to aspects of christianity to sikhism again highlights for me how it might be useful to think of religion not just as a practice, or a fixed identity, but as a journey of finding and reconciling with ones personal values.