Conversion and Personal Authority

Have you ever “believed” in something with your whole heart, and been challenged to explain that belief with clear facts and no emotion?

I have—usually by members in my birth family. And it’s really difficult, especially in these changing times. I must confess, I am an emotional person, and no matter how hard I try, certain individuals seem to get the best of me. I’ve tried over and over to figure out “why” they do, and how I can keep the pattern from repeating itself, but I’m never successful when their challenges come.

Could this be part of the reason?

“Conversion from our entrenched thinking patters and lifetime images of how things are may well be the most difficult conversion process of all. For in the process of changing thinking and images comes the challenge to act out of a new perception of reality, a new faith. Move! Stand up and be counted! Be involved! Witness to what you are now being led to believe!

The difficulty is that the new perception of reality is initially not as cohesive or as systemized as the old vision. People see they should change, see that some of their long-held images and ideas are no longer valid in the light of preaching or learning, but want someone to package a whole new system of understanding for them. Living with mystery and unanswered questions and taking personal authority for those convictions is a new experience…it is also easy for fear…to take over.” (Michael Morwood, Tomorrow’s Catholic, pp. 83-84)

I have been challenged – again – over the course of the last couple of days regarding a political opinion that I posted on Facebook (FB be the death of me yet!). The most aggressive challenges usually come from members in my own family, those I grew up with. Problem is, I’ve changed, and I’m caught in the middle of this new “conversion”. I’m being challenged to “stand up and be counted,” to validate my convictions, and I don’t have any answers. I, myself, am living in the throes of mystery and unanswered questions. I don’t have facts to prove what I am being challenged to “prove”. Furthermore, I’m very, very new at “taking personal authority for those convictions.” I’ve never done that before.

For most of my 61 years, my religious beliefs and political convictions were rooted in someone else’s ideas. Truth is, it’s only been in the last 10 years that I’ve even begun having political convictions. And I am still in the middle of many shifts, some of which all of us find ourselves in right now (religious, economic, social, political, historical, scientific, etc., etc.). I don’t have many facts to point to, nor has anyone “package[ed] a whole new system of understanding for [me].” Dammit, I haven’t even been able to formulate for myself with any clarity what I believe. I’m simply attempting to take personal authority – on gut instinct/intuition alone, right now. That’s really all I have and that doesn’t convince anyone, especially certain members of my family.

I talked this over with Doug Travis, a priest who led our all-church retreat last year. He identified with me. He’s had the same experiences in his family, and he gave me a pretty good picture of what’s happening. He said the most difficult individuation to make was inside a birth family context. It’s kind of like a crab in an ice chest. One crab decides to make a break for it and tries to crawl out of, and the others keep pulling it back in. That’s how I feel, constantly being dragged back into an environment that simply doesn’t work for me anymore. And to be truthful, it flat makes me angry certain individuals keep demanding “proof” “backed up” with “facts”, when all I have comes from simply a “heart knowing.” And it really makes me mad when I “put my foot down”, and they come back with the idea that I’m “emotional.” Yes, I am angry, and there’s nothing wrong with being angry. So there (foot stomped like a 4-year old)!

Ok, that’s off my chest. At least for this go ‘round. Someday, hopefully, this merry-go-round will stop and I’ll be able to get off. Maybe when “ego” is no longer my ever faithful companion.