Where I Find Faith as an Atheist

The secret sauce? Learning to let go.

Continuing the discussion of the values I hold close—and encouraging you to find your own—today (after touching on connection and creativity) I want to focus on faith, the third in my list of five.

I’m an atheist (who grew up Jewish and still has a strong connection to the Jewish culture). So you might be wondering why and even how faith became one of my top values. This might be a matter of semantics, and I admit I might be taking artistic liberties with the word.

Because, for me, faith is more of a belief in the unknown unfolding of circumstance, and trust in the fullness of time to reveal answers and clarify direction.

For those of you who follow twelve steps of any kind, think of Step 2. Here is Alanon’s take on Step 2: “Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.”

Since I have been going to Alanon on and off for about seven years, I have done a fair amount of exploration regarding the concept of “Higher Power,” or “Power greater than ourselves,” and I’ve found a way that resonates with me to experience that as something other than “God.” (And obviously, I’m not knocking people who believe in God. You do you, just please don’t use it as an excuse to intentionally hurt any individual along the way.)

As an atheist, I absolutely have faith. I have faith in the pause (even though I don’t always remember to practice it), I have faith in the mystery of tomorrow, and I have faith in my own resources. Those things are, for me, part of that power greater than myself.

Another power I feel connected to is the essence of my grandma—the ways she looked at the world, the style with which she communicated. This is indeed a higher power for me; not so much the, ya know, “ghost” of her, but rather, all the beauty and joy she sprinkled throughout the world during her time here. That is a higher power for me; that is faith.

But I don’t believe in God, and I think religion is at the root of so much evil. I also see the beauty of it for some people and communities, and I feel lucky to connect with communities in other ways. I’m sure that what we get out of our own respective safe spaces is pretty similar.

This morning, I did some research to see what others have written about atheists having faith, and I didn’t really come up with much. Mostly, I read about how atheists (and some agnostics) claim ignorance—the opposite of faith. If I squint my eyes, the truth is, I might be saying the same thing … but categorizing my ignorance as my faith.

I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow (despite my collection of tarot cards and witchy paraphernalia, because despite being an atheist, I find it fun and satisfying to connect with the mystical side of myself), and that unknowing is exactly where my faith comes from. It allows me to not feel the need to control every situation (as if I could control anything in the first place besides my own actions), and it reminds me that I can gently and lovingly tell my impatience to take a chill pill (when I was a kid, I used to say “pill chill”). When I am genuinely in touch with my faith as I describe it, I am much more Zen.

But I’m never complacent, especially when it comes to issues of injustice. And I don’t think the two—faith and inaction—should be confused. If I approach my activism from a place of empowerment and unknowing, I can remain open to multiple outcomes.

Even with issues of social justice, there are multiple scenarios that can lead to liberation.

Having faith does not mean making an excuse to walk away; to me, it just means remaining humble and curious as I go about both self-growth and activism.

And, as you can imagine, humility and curiosity are also very helpful character traits to embody when interviewing people—which I do with frequency.

In a guest essay published by the Wall Street Journal, entitled “Why Atheists Need Faith,” I was at first nodding in agreement when author Michael Guillen said:

The overwhelming evidence, I’ve discovered, makes it crystal clear: Faith is the foundation of the entire human experience—the basis of both science and religion. Our faith in physical reality drives us to seek treatments for deadly diseases like Covid-19, to explore the depths of the sea, to invent the perfect source of energy. Our faith in spiritual reality drives us to create breathtaking works of art, music, and architecture; to see life as a divine creation, not an accident of nature; to be curious about things that are not of this world.

Yaaaas, Queen! That’s so well put, and so on the nose of how I feel.

But then I got to this zinger:

For all those reasons and more, I’ve come to learn that atheists are greatly mistaken: Faith is anything but a weakness. It is the mightiest power in the universe.

Um, are atheists mistaken though? Do we feel that faith is a weakness? Because I actually consider it a core value of mine and completely agree that it is a mighty power. And though I haven’t done any studies, many of my friends are also atheists and feel similarly to me in this regard.

Either that or I’m using the word “faith” incorrectly, which I admit I might be doing, but it feels right for me anyway so I’m sticking with it for now.

Because that’s my business. As is my uterus. But I digress.

The reason I had gone down this path of exploring my values was that I recently honed in on them throughout many months of working with my coach on which are most meaningful to me. This allows me to use these values—connection, creativity, faith, family, and career—to shape my days and my year. If I’m spending too much time focusing on something that is outside of these values, I can take a long, hard look at it and decide if it’s something I can let go of.

I will continue to explore the remaining two of my top five, and encourage you to connect with your own values, too.

xo,

jazz