"It is enough for a person to have to die once, don't make him have to die twice."
-Jose Saramago, The Gospel According to Jesus Christ
I'm not even halfway done reading this book and yet I'm already quoting it. Well, technically I lifted this quote from Bob Corbett (http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/personal/reading/saramago-gospel.html) who did a review of Saramago's "irreverent, profound, skeptical, funny, heretical, deeply philosophical, provocative and compelling" book.
First things first, I'm a Christian--a Born Again Christian, to be specific. But I don't let my faith, my religion interfere or hinder me from intellectual pursuit (yeah, right). As a UP student, I'm taught to be critical of things but I do not drop my faith altogether because this same faith helps me keep my feet on the ground and provide the answers, the solace I need in times of great distress and challenges. But still, I have questions.
And the answers to these unanswerable questions I try to find in other sources--a method in research called triangulation.
I have wanted to read this book by Saramago the first time I saw it at the bookstore. The title, book cover and the author's "Nobel Prize for Literature" made me want the book but the price (yes, that one thing) kept me from buying it. But as a Christmas gift for my blockmate, I picked this book thinking I'll read it first before giving it to him. But it turns out he preferred receiving a long-sleeved polo. So there, I was stuck, fortunately, with the book, which is, by far, the most expensive book I've bought with my own money, for myself.
Anyway, this book, aside from giving a bit different account (take note I'm at pg. 58 of the 341 pages) of Jesus' life, instills in me a rather fleeting doubt of the truth of what the Bible says. Add to this doubt, my UP professors' unsettling empirical facts that goes against what is in the Bible (ie, there were no tables in Jesus' time and yet the Bible says, in different accounts, that there were tables). Remember, lies are like cockroaches--if you see one, there are others. All these "additional" facts made me, yes, doubt the truth behind God and Jesus Christ etc. But I assure you, or anyone else who cares, that this doubt is not big enough to make me refute my faith in Jesus Christ.
Yes, I understand there may be alterations to what really transpired in those times thus, I shouldn't believe everything that is laid for me as facts. What I do is this, I become eclectic. Yes, I believe that Jesus Christ is my Savior, I believe that our faith (supproted by our actions) saves us, I believe that everyone should be treated equally--men, women, rich, poor, I believe that things--whether we like it or not, whether it seems good or bad--happen to us because God allows them to happen, and that He wouldn't let it happen if it's not good for us, in any way. I believe we have no right to judge others according to morality because the very idea of morality is a mere social construct. Thus, the central thesis of my so-called eclectic belief system is this: If what you're doing does not hurt others in any way, do it. Because chances are it makes you really happy. As a social science major (I don't want to call myself a social scientist just yet), I believe in this,
".... in a great history little truths can be altered so that the greater truth emerges."
-Umberto Eco, Baudolino, Chapter 40
"Men, forgive Him, for He knows not what He has done."
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