Religious Renaissance

It's no secret that I am a very outspoken person. It's also no secret that I like to challenge the majority-- not in an rebellious, down with the moral majority way... more of a you may think you know the truth kind of way. After all, sometime you need to stir the pot just to keep people honest. I take pride in sometimes being able to step outside of myself and think outside of the box.

Really, it can be quite fun to find this line of thought that is so far away from the generally accepted. It is even more fun when you have a fact that can back up what many see as a radical thought. Hitting people with that little tidbit just brings a priceless look to their faces.

After all, science explains nothing. In fact, it ignores contradicting opinion to an extent. Scientific fact only needs to be plausible 85% of the time to be accepted.

Though, that makes you think why a weatherman needs to be right only 35% of the time to be American Meterological Society approved. I really take no comfort in seeing an AMS approved forecast-- there's a 65% chance he's wrong!

So it should come as no shock to many of you that over the past several years of my life I've been experiencing what I call a religious renaissance.

Please don't call me a born-again Christian... Christianity was never dead to me. I just questioned it. I lost my faith-- not in God-- just the ability to blindly accept some of the teachings.

Amazingly, I was at a catholic high school when I started to lose faith. Having a former nun call you a heretic in class will do that to you. The simple reason, I questioned something (in my usual sarcastic way) and the teacher had no answer.

Was it so wrong of me to grow as a person by asking questions about things that didn't make sense? OK, thousands of people-- who now exist in light-weight carbon form-- are probably laughing at me from above. They were all burned at the stake for doing the same... kinda makes you love the freedoms we have now.

It set off an alarm in my mind that I didn't want to be a part of a church that couldn't accept that I had questions, that I wanted to know more. After all, doesn't everything have an explanation?

So for a few years I brushed off organized religion-- though I never renounced my faith. I just spent the past few years doing some soul searching, and doing it on my own terms. Some people go to a building with a man on the cross, others do so in the direction of Mecca... the world was my place of worship.

But now I laugh. A friend of mine was talking to me about introducing me to 'someone'-- but asked about my religious views. Fair enough, some people are not as open-minded about religion. And I took that moment to begin to look back at where I have been and where I am going. I've found myself right back in the arms of the Catholic church.

Who knew?

You see, perhaps it was God's will for me to go out and search my soul... knowing that by doing so my faith would grow again. What is even more shocking is that I've found myself quoting scripture on message boards and in personal conversations with friends. I guess it's not much of a shock condiering despite my journey, I still kept a Bible in my hockey locker.

Seriously, you can't be a goaltender in sports and not be religious. God, Jesus, Sacre Bleu (holy cheese-- and other holy things) ... they all come up a lot during games. Not necessarily appropriate, but you still acknowldge their existence.

I have been led back to my roots. The question is-- was that 'someone' my friend wanted to introduce me to an angel?