A year or so ago Ali and I enjoyed a weekend get-away in Co. Wexford. We stayed at a hotel which had been recommended to us. The dinner menus at this hotel were curious and not my cup of tea. Like "served on a bed of..." and when the plate came the only food of substance seemed to be that of the "bed" but on closer inspection and taste I can only surmise it was not intended to be eaten. One of the "puddings", and one I chose in distress nothing else appearing palatable, was "pavlova deconstructed". When the desert came it contained one or two very small blobs of meringue, a few berries, perhaps half a strawberry and a small splodge of cream. And the usual ridiculous "jus" patterns on the considerable void of the rest of the otherwise empty plate. I was not impressed. Why should one pay more for eating less?
I used this story in the "opening" aka "devotion" I gave earlier this week adding that, at present, I feel like what I thought was my "faith" is under deconstruction. I went on to expose false ideas of what it means to "believe". As an example I explained how I had recently set a ladder on the tin roof and against our boiler's chimney which is no more than a steel pipe. I wanted to clean the flue. I had evidence gained from experience that the set-up would take my weight, but I could not be sure until I committed myself to climbing it. The bridge between the necessary evidence and the outworking I identified as "belief" or "faith". The evidence and the outworking were two essential ingredients but they did not meet in the middle.
I explained that, quite apart from anything Christian, the human psyche could be strongly affected by what we believe, citing
medical examples of remarkable restorations to health just because the patient believed a treatment, even a placebo, would do the trick.
I thought I made it clear that much of what I, and doubtless we, call "belief" in Christianity is wishful thinking or confirmation bias. I was nervous saying this because I thought I might be ousted!
The curious thing is that, although several folk thanked me for sharing, no-one made any reference to my apostasy. Which was all very curious.
And then to cap it all, after the evening meal desert was do-it-yourself-deconstructed-pavlova. Only this time the quantities were right!
