Doubt and Faith–Two Sides of the Same Coin
The Sorrowing Soul Between Doubt and Faith – Elihu Vedder
What if doubt and faith are simply two sides of the same coin and without one the other cannot really exist? What if doubt is not the opposite of faith? What if, in the polarity that is doubt and faith, it the experience of doubt that drives the stages of faith development forward? What if, without doubt, faith is simply a collection of reassuring thoughts that tend to support a level of dependency needs? What if doubting one’s faith is a necessary stage of spiritual growth even if it is a painful stage of spiritual growth? Philosopher Miguel de Unamuo once remarked that those who believe in God but who do so without anguish, uncertainty or doubt, actually believe only in the idea of God and not in God himself. This stage of faith development that is belief about God is that state of spiritual development called the Form/Institutional stage.
A mental belief in a collection of reassuring thoughts and ideas does not reach the depths of the heart that can take one into the higher stages of spiritual development. These are the higher stages of spiritual development where one becomes a knower and not simply one who settles for knowing about the God one professes to believe in. This belief in a set of ideas and collection of thoughts is what most people take to be religious faith. This belief, however, is only one of many stages of faith development. It is that stage of faith development where the individual takes the wisdom teachings literally. This stage of faith development is called childish literalism. This is were the words of the wisdom teachings are taken literally as written. For example the idea that the world was made in six days is taken to mean that the world was in fact created in six week days. The creation myth of the Garden of Eden is taken quite literally as place where there is a tree that bears fruit of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
Stages of Faith Development and Doubt
How does one develop what are called more mature stages of faith? The paradoxical answer is through doubt. One begins to see faith and doubt not as opposites but as energies that invite the higher stages of faith development. Without the experience of doubt you would not begin to ask deeper questions of life and you would thus not take the quest that ultimately leads you to knowing rather than believing. Without the experience of doubt you would avoid the quest into a more expansive dimension of faith. Without the journey, into and through doubt, you would not enter a mature faith that would be able to move such mountains of doubt. Doubts force us to stop accepting half truths and false security. Doubt makes us question the authority of those who tell us what we should believe. Certainly, without this form of questioning, one simply remains an individual who never claims their own authority in matters of the highest value. Doubt forces us to stir ourselves out of bed and take the road of trials that is a stage of the spiritual development map known as The Hero’s Journey.
The Road of Trials means that we follow the call to claim our own truth as written within the heart. Doubt can be seen as a precursor to higher levels of faith development. This is the road of trials that takes you through disbelief and into communion with that which is beyond belief. It takes you into true communion and into the direct knowing of that truth that really sets you free of doubt. A crisis of faith, is thus an opportunity to deepen your spiritual development. A loss of faith can bring you to discover what is beyond belief. This crises of faith often takes place around the age of forty and is that stage of life referred to as midlife. There is guidance along the road of trials but it usually arrives in new and unique ways. This guidance comes from within and then manifests without. The life stage called midlife crisis is that stage of personal and spiritual development that asks us to place our faith in the inner.
My own crisis of faith is not just a one off experience but a developing journey of experiences. I am no longer so disturbed by experiencing times of doubt and confusion. The real issue for me personally is not so much the issue of doubt but the issue of impatience. I am now moving into the second half of life as an elder and mentor and have a deep desire to be more effective in this way. I also have doubts about how I might most effectively move in this direction. This is the direction where my heart lies and thus this is were my treasure is also. It is in the process of trusting the still small voice within that I experience impatience. Impatience is another form of doubt. If I where to have infinite patience then I would be able to manifest what I desire instantaneously. This struggle with impatience is my road of trials. In my own quest I am asked to be ever more patient and this is one aspect of my character that I really do struggle with.
Echo and Narcissus – John William Waterhouse
I have been graced that stage of faith development that I call Knowing. This is a state of Godliness. This means that the mental construct referred to as belief no longer holds any attraction for me. A believer is someone who is a believer in a God of Love whereas the knower is in fact the Lover. What have these stages of belief and faith got to do with personal development and beyond? In this blog I write for a certain age group. This is the age group who are thirty five years or more and who are approaching midlife. These individuals will transition into the second half of life and begin to quest for deeper meaning and purpose than the narcissistic pursuit of ideas of success versus failure that are often the focus of the first half of life. These are the individuals who are at a stage in life where their questions become more universal rather than self centred.
This Western culture that I live is has its primary focus on productivity, consumerism and the culture of youth. This leaves the individual who questions this purely material focus in the dark as to how they might transit this time of midlife that I call the Will to Meaning. This period of will to meaning that includes the struggle with doubt versus faith is often a time when one finds oneself in a metaphorical dark forest. However, even within dark forests there are signposts that point the way into a clearing. These signposts are contained within the myths that are shared all around the world. These signposts are contained within the wisdom teachings of all the worlds religions provided. That is provided that you do not cling to the signpost that is the stage of faith development of the one who believes about God and who will not take the journey into doubt that paradoxically develops their faith.
These blog posts are this writer and storytellers attempt at guiding you into a more expansive understanding of belief, faith and knowing. It is the experience of knowing that is the culmination of true faith. You only need a small amount. One glimpse will do it provided that following that glimpse you pay fidelity to the invitation within it. Your work is to pay fidelity to that experience of knowing and how it is intended to be expressed through you for the highest good of all. In this way you deepen your spiritual development and you move through stages of faith development until your faith is a direct knowing of the universal. This is the rock that is not moved by the shifting sands of a childlike literal belief system that one has adopted but never questioned or spend time avoiding questioning. Without doubt one is not invited into a struggle of deep authenticity and interiority where one becomes not a believer but a knower that one is Love.
OTHER GREAT CONTENT Here is some other material that will further your personal and spiritual development and your understanding of the various stages of spiritual development.
stages of faith development
THE NEXT STAGES IN HUMAN EVOLUTION - We are now entering the twenty-first century and the third millennium. A perceptible feeling hangs in the air that the world is rapidly approaching one of history’s decisive seismic shifts. Changes are looming ahead o
SPIRITUALITY IN HIGHER EDUCATION - The study shows student life is enhanced if students engage in "inner work" through activities such as meditation or self-reflection
SEVEN STAGES OF SPIRITUAL EVOLUTION - n his spiritual evolution, man passes through different stages, each of them having some specific characteristics. Recognizing these characteristics can open the path toward superior levels which leads us to perfecti
