FAITH, HOPE, LOVE…. RELIGION?

Every religion is good. Every religion has its own beauty. Unfortunately, we mistook it for faith and treat beliefs as a label, which opens a door to discrimination.

Most of us, who were raised in Christian families, know this story perfectly well. Every Sunday – church. We didn’t like this, not really. Best case scenario, we were just bored. We took some toys with us, to fill this endless hour with something more joyful. Then we came home and God forbid if we thought about Him until next Sunday.

Next thing – we grow up. While being a teenager everything becomes a compulsion to us and we start to rebel against everything. That way we’re creating the most popular view in society, which defines faith as religion. The effect of it is seeing God only as an everyday reality like politics and school. Unfortunately, we don’t like these things and we close ourselves off to any signs of his presence.

Nowadays the world is controled by mass media and society has started to trust its messages, which are focused on the negative aspects of every occurance, for example: a priest who molested a kid or terrorism at the hands of Muslims. In that way we forget about the good sides of religion and beliefs, and start to discriminate against people who believe, judging people who made a mistake or commited a crime.Karolina Kania gotowe 2

The truth is, all religions come from one foundation – faith, but they evolve with people. They adapt them to their needs like Martin Luther in 16th Century. He created Protestantism, because he didn’t agree with some aspects of the Catholic Church’s actions. We all make this mistake, thinking we must sign onto everything that people of our religion say is right or appropriate and we label our beliefs. This way faith sounds a little bit shallow.

My history with God started like most of yours. I went to church, but I didn’t feel like it for long time. Then I got a chance to get to know faith from people, who follow it, yet not the church’s rules. That’s how I discovered that everybody believes in different ways, because if you’re a true believer, you don’t need any labels or limitations. You just have to stick to this one simple rule, that every religion has – become the best version of yourself with the least amount of immorality and try to make your environment better.

It may seem simple even without faith, but from experience – it’s a lot simpler if you’re doing this believing in something that’s beautiful. It’s like tight hug from the whole world; warm, safe and comforting. It gives you pure strength for dealing with all your problems, loving people like they deserve and seeing the world like a masterpiece full of small and big miracles.

Korekta: Natalie Menezes
Zdjęcia: Karolina Kania

English Magda Brewczyk
Magda Brewczyk