Higher Power:

Believers And Nonbelievers Trace The Steps

Of Their Spiritual Journeys

By Nancy K. Crevier

Why does belief in a higher power exist in cultures worldwide in one form or another, and why has it existed from century to century?

What we believe, or how we practice what we believe, is easier to answer. For many with faith, what we believe is what we are taught, what our parents and their parents were taught. It is ritual handed down from generation to generation. How we practice what we believe is seen in our actions and inactions, in the habitual practices that we have learned. But why do we believe?

In a world where science has put forth evidence of creation, time and space, evolution, and more, it would seem that the need to believe would be assuaged, that belief would be viewed as a sort of quaint practice of a primitive need.

In a recent New York Times Magazine article, Robin Marantz Henig examined the various theories of why belief exists. Scientists studying the evolution of religion “tend to agree on one point: that religious belief is an outgrowth of brain architecture that evolved during early human history. What they disagree about is why a tendency to believe evolved….” wrote the author.

Why an individual believes or not, and how belief or lack of it benefits themselves or others, as well as thoughts on life after death and how that plays into belief, were questions put forth to several Newtown residents willing to ponder and then to share their personal thoughts about those questions with The Bee. Separating the “why” and “why not” of belief from the “what” was not a simple act, even after much thought. Personal experiences, backgrounds, training, and education were repeated themes of the “why” of believing for these people.

 All of those interviewed expressed a great respect for other people’s belief systems, regardless of whether they themselves believed in a higher power or not. Each one acknowledged that how a person lives in this world is a personal journey.

Everything Is Provisional

Wally Wood does not think that a tendency to believe exists. “Everything I know is provisional,” said Mr Wood, a fiction writer and ghostwriter of business books with a degree in philosophy from Columbia University. “Experience has shown that we believe things because we were taught them, or heard them. In growing up, experience teaches us that that is not true.” He does not have a belief in a higher power at this point in his life, he said, although he is open to being proved wrong. “It is pure accident that we are here. Think about how many random events had to occur to bring us to this place, to bring us here,” mused Mr Wood.

One reason that plays into why he does not believe, he said, is his feeling that belief is primitive. “Early beliefs were used to explain how the world works,” he said. Humans have evolved to a point where mystical explanations are no longer required.

 Mr Wood feels no need for a guiding presence to act as a moral compass, nor is he concerned about an afterlife. That is not to say that time here does not matter. “I can make a difference; I can volunteer in a prison, I can volunteer with Habitat for Humanity. I can pass on my knowledge to young people,” he said, all things that he chooses to do with his time here. “I can’t change this world, but I believe I can make a difference in a tiny piece of it. I do believe I am connected to other people here and now. It’s my actions that make the difference, certainly not if I believe [in a higher power] that makes a difference to others,” said Mr Wood.

Nor is there room for the supernatural in his life, said Mr Wood, asking, “And what is the difference between a superstition and a faith?”

A Direct Encounter

Rose Bergen also falls back on experience when mulling over the question of why belief exists. Ms Bergen, a spiritual yoga instructor and former Newtown resident now living in Oregon, says that belief is experience. “I don’t think you can stand on another person’s belief,” she said, “I think you have to have your own experience. It’s a direct encounter.”

Ms Bergen’s life blossomed during an encounter with God, she said, as an adolescent. “I was sitting for a meditation, relaxed and focused, and I offered a prayer — just in case He was real. I said, ‘Whoever and wherever and if you are…’ It was an adolescent prayer. I had had health problems, and that day, I decided to surrender. I would not ask to be healed, I would accept the situation as it was. That simple act created a tiny little space inside of me and that’s when the unconditional love of God penetrated and flooded my being. I sat down not knowing if God was real and I stood up with an unshakeable knowing that God is real,” said Ms Bergen. “When you have an encounter with the living God, you are knocked off course. I’ve never gone back to doubting.”

Knowing a God who is an “expansive space of unfathomable love” is beneficial to those around her, Ms Bergen said. “With family, it makes you know that what you know about yourself is true for them. It changes the whole dynamics. What you do to another person is not separate from yourself or the living God. It keeps you in check and balance.” Belief helps us to find purpose in our lives, said Ms Bergen.

Ms Bergen does not fear what may or may not follow death. “What we are really after is life before death. Most of us are asleep and call it life. If we don’t find life here, then I don’t think there is a life after death.”

Love and a reason for existence is deeper than what science can explain, Ms Bergen expressed. “We live in a world of duality that is this world, our bodies, male and female. Love and life exist beyond the world of duality. I have no doubt that there is a love greater than what we are here,” Ms Bergen said.

An Act Of Humility

Why Denise Kaiser believes is not based on the need for a personal God, or a belief in heaven or hell, nor does she think that belief in a higher power provides any kind of moral guide. “After all, if we run rampant, we destroy our society. How is that beneficial?” she asked.

She went on to say, “It’s not that I ‘get’ anything out of believing. I don’t assume that the only things that exist in the universe are things that humans can quantify. Belief is an act of humility.”

Standing on the highest point in Jerusalem, Ms Kaiser once experienced that humility, she said. “In the desert, when the sun sets it gets very cold, very quickly. I was standing there watching the darkness settle in on one side, seeing this glorious sunset on the other side, and suddenly this great ‘whoosh’ of warm wind came up and wrapped around me. You hear about the breath of God and you can imagine how ancient people might have thought that of a wind like this. There are moments that crystallize things for you. There is a feeling of something so much greater in nature that hits you viscerally. Do we really know everything?” she asked.

Ms Kaiser, who is a medieval historian, said, “I can accept the scientific explanation, but it only goes so far. It’s logical for me to believe. It’s logical to say there is something outside of what we know.”

A God-Shaped Hole

Belief is more than a trick of the brain, more than a leftover trace from evolution, said Jennifer Ober, a nurse practitioner. There may be a sort of “hardwire” in the brain for belief, but if there is, she believes it was put there by God. “God made us in His image. I believe God put a soul in us to believe in Him,” she said. “God places into us a desire to believe. I think everyone is born with a desire to find God, but they don’t answer to His calling. Or rather, maybe I should say that we are born with God looking for us. In some, the Holy Spirit allows them to believe.

“Blaise Pascal [a French mathematician, physicist, and religious philosopher] said that ‘We have a God-shaped hole in us that only God can fill.’ That has been true for me in my life,” said Ms Ober. “We look for a lot of things, as humans, to satisfy our souls, but only God can do that for me.” Faith is a belief in the things unseen. It is a gift, said Ms Ober. “Everyone is given faith, but I don’t think everyone opens the gift.”

Belief guides her through life in much the same way that a child follows the guidance of a parent, providing a source of comfort and unconditional love in a manner that no person can, said Ms Ober. There are other benefits to belief, as well, among them what she called “the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, self-control, and faithfulness.” Belief is a bond that strengthens her marriage, she said, and belief has guided her to make the choice in her life to serve others as a medical provider. “If God has a plan for your life and you obey, it is only to benefit others,” she explained.

To see the miracle of birth, the way the seasons change, the beauty in each person, or the awe of a sunset only clarifies for her why she knows that there is an experience that goes beyond what can be determined scientifically. “I can see the effects of God and I can experience the products of God,” she said.

There is no conundrum between what science proves and what she knows she believes. “The science and the mystical are the same because God created both of them,” she explained.

She compared belief in a higher power to belief in other things that are not physically apparent, like love, for instance. “It’s hard to know why you believe [in God] just like it’s hard to explain other things. Love is not tangible. It’s understood by anyone who has felt it, but it is not something you can touch. Belief is like that,” explained Ms Ober.

What Comes From Within

Some people do find comfort in the idea of an all-knowing presence guiding them through life, said Julie Stern, but she does not find that necessary for herself. “Eric Fromm said that children need a mother goddess and that we need a patriarchal god when we get older. They can make bad or good things happen. Then, when we are old enough to rationalize and to be reasonable, we understand that it is just better to do things because they are good. Adults can choose to be ‘good’ because it is the right thing to do. You don’t need a belief, a ‘carrot,’ to do the right thing,” she said.

An English and philosophy major, Ms Stern is an adjunct professor at WestConn in Danbury. Her father was a doctor who also felt no inborn desire to believe in a higher power, nor did her mother. Both of her parents were very respectful of the comfort others found in belief, she said, observing that her father was particularly ethical and conscientious of how people should be treated.

She herself has no problem with other people’s belief in a higher power. As a child growing up in New York, she belonged to a youth group, and there she mingled with children of many different beliefs and religions; and the housekeeper who raised her was a person whom she saw as receiving a lot of support from that woman’s church. “I learned to say all kinds of prayers and hymns. It was very nice, but they were just nice stories. I have a tremendous respect for that and a respect for the music,” she said.

Comfort and a sense of duty and justice come from within and from her family, said Ms Stern. To continue to rely on the guidance of an unseen spirit after adolescence is a sign of not wanting to mature, she said. “Our society encourages immaturity,” she said. “We need not be governed by our appetites. It was Plato who said, ‘Let intellect guide you.’”

Like Mr Wood, Ms Stern believes that it is fortunate accident that puts humanity here and now. “While we’re here, we have the capacity to figure out what’s right and wrong.” Belief in a higher power is not necessary for anyone to make the world a better place while living. “That is our responsibility,” she said.

A Social Connection

“When I see the sun shining on the Pootatuck River, see the blue sky, see the beauty all around us, I think, why would we not believe?” said Tim Reilly. “Belief is an integral part of who I am. I’m not sure if I think belief is innate or not. I think it’s part of my upbringing, which was with a strong foundation and a loving family.”

He cannot recall a time when he did not believe in God. He believes because he was taught to believe. “I equate belief with faith. Faith is confidence that things that we hope will happen, will happen. I think that believing in God completes us.”

Having belief helps to define who we are, said Mr Reilly. “Belief in a higher power gives me a love for life, knowing each day is an opportunity to try to make good choices, to be the best husband, father, person I can be.” Belief serves a social service, as well, said Mr Reilly. “We tend to socialize with people who have the same beliefs, we enjoy spending time with others who believe the same,” he pointed out. This kind of socializing builds a network of people on whom he can rely.

In ancient times, having a backup of reliable comrades meant survival. The continuation of the human species is fairly certain at this point in time, but surviving on a day-to-day basis in a manner that causes a person to thrive is still a struggle for many. A social group of those with similar beliefs may provide a safety net of sorts. Social networks formed through common belief could be viewed as a loose connection between the science of “why” and the faith of “why,” thought Mr Reilly.

Scientists will continue to query, doers will do, and believers will believe. Why we arrive at the place where we are may not be so important as the journey that takes us there.