Belief is tricky. One day I do. One day I don’t. Believe. But there are things I believe that have never wavered. My belief in God is not one of those. Not long ago, I made a list, my attempt to address this question: “Do I believe in God?” It went like this:
God as an old white man with a beard—No
God as a human—No
God as a being—No
God as energy—Yes
God as consequential—Don’t know
God without definition—Yes
God as a creative force in the Universe—Yes
God as natural processes in motion—Yes
God as evolution—Yes
God as gravity—Yes
God as love—Yes
God as forgiveness—Yes
God as beauty—Yes
God as a no and a yes—Maybe
God as wrathful and merciful—Perhaps—This one scares me.
God as Mystery—Most certainly
I realized through my Q & A exercise that my problem is with the word “God,” for all the limitations it has placed on my imagination, such as “God the Father.” This was the beginning of my erosion with Mormonism in particular and religion in general. It happened early. I watched birds and studied them. If I dreamed of a great horned owl and saw one the next day, that was normal, to be expected. If a yellow warbler came into my mind, it was not unusual for me to hear one. As a child, I came to understand my relationship to nature was reciprocal and that nature had a relationship with me. We called to one another. We called one another into being. What I mean by that is we have evolved together. I still have a tailbone. I trust what I see and I believe what I feel. Trusting direct experience is the open door to revelation. This was my foundation for faith. It still is.
~ Terry Tempest Williams, Erosion: Essays of Undoing (Sarah Crichton Books, October 8, 2019)
Portrait of Terry Tempest Williams by Cheryl Himmelstein
