Fear Without Faith

It occurs to me that a lot of the hyper-fear surrounding the Coronavirus partly stems from the general lack of faith in society. I saw an image on Twitter just over half an hour ago showing a school library where the books had been taped over. Literally cordoned off like a crime scene. It's quite insane. I can't help but think the people doing these things have a serious lack of faith. They seem to be so scared of death that they can't enjoy the bigger picture of life.

Personally, for what it's worth, I'm agnostic. At least that's my official position anyway. I feel that there's more to life. That there's some higher meaning to it all. I even pray sometimes. However, I also recognise that I can't really prove any of this. To myself, let alone to other people. The belief I have that there is some greater meaning does inform my decisions and helps me in my life though.

I would hate not to have this. It must be awful to have a materialistic worldview that only sees the mechanics and minutiae of life. In fact, I know it's awful to have this worldview because it's a worldview I used to hold. As a child I was a total atheist. My parents weren't especially religious nor fundamentally non-religious. So I largely got to make up my own mind, though no doubt I was influenced in numerous subtle ways by my surroundings. When I was then introduced to Christianity at school as a small child I quickly threw the baby out with the bathwater. Much of it just seemed silly and irrational, so I deemed all of it silly and irrational. Though looking back I think I did absorb a lot of the morality weirdly.

It was only much later as I got older that I cottoned on; proving something is impossible in this reality doesn't discount the idea that there may be things beyond this reality.

Or rather. Science and rational logic may tell us that it's impossible for a man to speak to angels, or for some other miraculous event to occur. However, that doesn't disprove the idea of God. The laws of science may govern this reality we find ourselves in, but we can't prove, nor disprove, that there's nothing beyond this reality we're experiencing. So agnosticism becomes the rational position. Though again, as with myself, I think it's fine for an individual to have a bias towards one side or the other. As long as it's recognised that ultimately it can't be proved either way.

Moving on a little.

It's a beautiful day outside, the Sun is shining, the birds are singing. I may feel like I'm having a "meaningful" experience, but can I prove it's meaningful? Whether to myself simply on some emotional or experiential level, or, to go further, in a wider "spiritual sense". If I can't prove it should I then throw that intuitive feeling out, and make myself immune to all such "feelings" in the future? Surely my experience and enjoyment of life would be much lessened were I to do that. In fact, how can I even prove it's a beautiful day? Do I measure the Sun's temperature, count the number of birds singing, then calculate the beauty in someway?

I feel that people towards the atheistic end of the spectrum tend to dissect their experience of life to death. Missing the big picture by focusing on the smaller aspects of it. Looking to understand the whole by focusing on and extrapolating from the narrow. Not seeing the wood for the trees so to speak.

I've went on a bit, much longer than I planned, but I guess I feel that the focus on Coronavirus to the exclusion of all else is a bit like this. The fear of death is completely ruining the enjoyment of life.