RELIGION

My recent learning on astrology, both Vedic and western, have caused my views on religion to change. Perhaps it is my logical mind that plagues me so. Although, I must admit, I do feel guilt many times. To reject the teachings of your community and forge your own path. At the back of my mind, it feels as though I have left the herd and I’m hidden from the Shepard. I am the lost coin, the unburned bush. I have an innate desire to learn about the mysteries of life. Why are we here? What is our purpose? Must we? Should we? What happens if we do not? What happens if we do? So many questions, so little answers, so naturally , I get stuck in the rabbit hole. I call it research, but I often think I am wasting my time because I’m not truly diving in. I have only just scratched the surface. To fully immerse myself into it would be a betrayal to my upbringing. I have a foot rooted in the past, fixed, and unwilling to let go, as with many other areas of my life. Nostalgia has become a subtle enemy. I want to pray sometimes, then I find myself reluctant to do so. The question is who or what am I praying to with my newfound knowledge? It is in these moments Nihilism whisper to me. We pray to whichever god we believe in, but does the outcome stay the same or does it change? Positive or negative? What if whatever outcome we get after praying is the original intended outcome. Yes, events of miracles have been recorded, but how often, given how much religious the world is? When a flight is about to crash and burn, the about to be victims pray, but who hears them? In war, who hears the cries of the 2-year-old kid with murdered parents? What matters? Do any of this?

  I called it a betrayal of the past, of my foundation. I wonder how much truth remains in that. I have memories of me going to a catholic church as my mom dropped me off with neighbors, since she was the breadwinner and had to provide for us. I learned to read the rosary and was taught the catholic doctrines. As I walk through the vaults of my memories, I stumble upon my other Muslim neighbors whom I would sit with, as their Imam taught them the Quran. I recited the foreign words alongside the kids. Then, I was thrown into a Christian high school that took religion like the first cries of a new born. It was an everyday business that became routine. You even knew the next songs to follow other praise songs. This is quite the vault you see, as I pull out another memory file of witnessing traditional practices. My grandfather, although I never met him, was an Ifa priest. A divinator. The understanding and merging of all these different religions have brought me to this path. There must be some sort of connection. Is there a God? And is this entity as we know it? What illusions surround its existence? Many of us are shackled by the idea of an heaven and hell. It is what keeps us grounded. If these variables are wiped off, what will be left but rejection of the unknown? Perhaps an increment of immorality, which will revert society back to its true undiluted human nature. Anarchy will rule, chaos will be the order of day. With this, I must say, religion is political. Religion is nothing but unconstitutional rules that bind us to humanity in ways laws cannot, in order to keep us obsequious. Religion is an illusion.

— Tolú