Leap of Faith

Today's civilization tends to be very fact-based.  Around the planet there is a plethora (I love that word!) of geologists, archeologists, biologists, philosophers, socialogists, etc., all trying to prove or disprove something.  It has almost become a game or a race to seek a chard of evidence that will prove the 'either - or' of a question.

The choice of the title Leap of Faith was made because we humans are following a track of negativism if we believe that absolutely everything mentionable has to have an absolute.  Have we lost our innocence and wonder to the point of 'monotone'.  When the wonder of it all has turned to absolutes then we lose the color of our surroundings, thus 'monotone'.  Expression disappears, hope no longer springs eternal, wishes upon a star will cease, and someday your prince will never come.  Wow!  That IS monotone.  There was a movie out a few years ago about a monotone town that started getting color as people experienced new things.  I didn't see the movie and can't recall it's name, but I remember the previews vividly.

Astronaut Gordon Cooper wrote a book in 2000 titled Leap of Faith, about the beginnings of the space program and the first few trips into space.  Just think what those young astronauts in the early days of NASA must have felt when those rocket thrusters ignited.  Now that is multicolor!

This is a leap of faith that most of us would never undertake!  God asks us to do this and we usually don't answer that request.  I often watch a TV show on the History International channel entitled The Naked Archeologist.  He is a Canadian of Romanian birth and is Jewish and I'm afraid his name escapes me.  He takes us all across the Holy Land in search of examples and even proof to back up biblical stories.  He has shown the only existing archeological physical proof that proves there were crucifixions during the time of Jesus.  Other things are proven, unproven, suggested, etc.  If something can not be proven to be true does that prove it is not true?  If, say, Joe Schmo believes a story that is spread through a hypothesis written by a marginal scholar, does that make him wrong or innovative?  Do we only believe what our 'church' tells us is true or do we seek some answers on our own, risking ridicule if we voice that thought? 

Does each of us subconsciously decide our beliefs based on facts or a mix of facts and faith?  Is our main challenge to take everything on faith or to reason parts of stories to fit a mold or to seek answers where few exist?  Maybe it's a combination of all three but, for almost everyone, the percentages of the combination change.  For instance, regardless of the religious denomination, every priest/pastor/rabbi will have a slightly different explanation on most messages of the Bible. 

We often hear the term, A Person's Belief System, and think nothing about it.  But think on that a moment and it's phenomenal to realize that each one of us has our own way of cataloging our thoughts into a method of deciding what we believe.  Give ten people the same facts, percentages, statistics and you will get 10 differing ideas and conclusions.  We are amazing aren't we?  We must stay multicolor and take those leaps of faith even when the leap is tiny...