Words:Action

The trouble with belief is that we get our identities all tied up in it. So when our belief is challenged, we're challenged. A challenge against my beliefs gets translated into an affront to my humanity or personality.

Which is why it's so hard for anybody when our basic assumptions get challenged. Psychology has an interesting take on this problem, called "Cognitive Dissonance Theory." Basically, if a person is presented with information contrary to a held belief (or performs an action that goes against what they believe), a dissonance between the action and the belief registers in their head: they know they've been inconsistant. And so people tend to respond in various ways to this dissonace:

1) Denial: "nothing's wrong, what are you talking about?" This doesn't usually last that long.

2) Reasoning: the person tries to use logic or reason to show how the belief and the action are actually compatable. You might say it's another form of denial.

3) Interpretation: The person changes the nature of their perception of the new information in order to make it compatable with their belief, or changes the nature of their perception of the belief to make it compatable with the concrete action. This is similar to reasoning, but while reasoning involves a logical process using factual information, this involves interpretation of information already at hand.

4) Projection: often in conjunction with reasoning, this is when a person lashes out emotionally against the source of the contrary information, declaring it wrong and accusing it of impure motives (or something to that effect).

5) Cognitive Acceptance: the person accepts in their mind that there is a dissonance between the two beliefs and doesn't care. This is probably the hardest to maintain of the reactions, because our minds are not built to deal with dissonance, they are built to resolve it. For example, a person who sees a purple cat doesn't usually just accept their first look as true, they have to look again and attempt to re-perceive the purple cat; it didn't match with their accepted definition of a cat, so they had to make sure it was what they saw.

6) Holistic Acceptance: the person accepts that there is a dissonance but in this case, actually does something to reconcile it, either changing belief, action, or perhaps even both (such as compromising both to match each other). In this is the hardest solution because it involves admitting that the person was wrong, and humility is extremely hard for anybody.

Take me for example. I often say that I'm a Jesus-follower. In fact, you might say that it's one of the central core characteristics of me. I try to think of myself as a Jesus follower first, a husband second, and then friend/employee/etc. after that. Often being a Jesus follower - in fact, pretty much all the time - has an impact on every other aspect of my life. So when things come that seem to conflict with my current understanding of what being a Jesus-follower means, I get ancy.

Things like poverty-alleviation and environmentalism. But lately I've had a growing feeling inside me that tells me I'm just not living up to my end of being a follower of Jesus. My missiology professor is fond of saying "don't tell me what you believe, let me observe you and I'll tell you what you believe." My theories of religion professor in college always would ask us, "I know that's what it seems to say, but that's because you assume certain things; what does it REALLY say?" I don't pray enough. I don't read enough scripture. When it comes down to it, I probably don't even depend on Jesus enough for ... well, everything, at least, not in my head. My head tells me that I'm the one that got me a job, even though it's not a job that I'm looking forward to. My head tells me that it's about me; seminary is about me taking classes to then go get a job and teach others because I'm so enlightened and they're not (as opposed to it being a partnership between student and teacher where both learn together).

Australia was really good for me in those regards, it helped me focus on needing Him in everyday stuff where I could SEE that I needed it; walking through the CBD was an adventure in itself, and especially for the first few months, it was all I could do to stay sane as I depended on Jesus to get me from place to place without getting too lost. Even when I became comfortable with the CBD, there was always learning to drive on the other side of the road, finding places in the outer suburbs with naught but my Melways to guide me, and then all the uncertainties of getting home. Depending on God for the little stuff translated into depending on him for the big stuff.

Now I'm in seminary and my education is all that matters, and it makes me wonder, am I really learning anything?

On some level, having a daughter will do wonders for this - I have no idea how the hell I'm supposed to be a father; it'll be trusting God again daily, just to keep the kid alive. We read books that tell us that I should spend time alone with her, and it's all I can do not to burst into tears hoping that it's not so, that I can stay safe from having to learn the hard way again. The worry I have about keeping her safe and teaching her well will have to be put aside as I work through it with Jesus, day by day.

But I still wonder, is there more to it? I sometimes think that I'm afraid of people; in Melbourne that was easy, because nobody looked at me as I walked down the street, nobody bothered me in my own little world. Here everybody bothers me because they actually have the gall to say "hi" or "good morning" or "I'm Dan, where are you from?"

My friend Sally thinks that maybe it's not really a fear of people, but a fear of myself. I suppose that everybody's probably afraid of themselves at least a little bit. I'm afraid that I'll say something that will embarrass me, and for some reason it's really important to me that people like me and think I'm very smart, that I have all the answers. My friend Mike once told me that I should stop being right all the time, it bugged him. At the time, I thought he meant that I'm actually right all the time, but now I'm starting to wonder if maybe he meant that I thought I was right but maybe I wasn't. It's funny, but being around lots of academics again is really humbling because now I can't reason my way out of dissonance anymore; I get called on it every time. Maybe this means I'll have to start changing some beliefs or some actions.

Maybe both.