On Being Religiously Deviant

After 3 years of barely seeing each other, me and my high school classmates reunited a few days ago. There were a lot of food and of course, a lot of booze and the next thing I knew, some of us were too drunk to go home.  During the time, we're waiting for being sober and for the sun to rise, we spent the time catching up and  we ended up discussing Shamcey Supsup's amswer during the Miss Universe Pageant.

Class Hottie and the other straight guy said they don't care (What do we expect?) My gay best friend and the two other girls were fanatically satisfied with her answer. Ex-Seminarian said he was pleased with her answer considering she reflects a God-centered life. It was supposed to be a "pampalipas oras" conversation until I opened my mouth and relayed my thoughts on her answer.

As someone who's not a biggie in beauty pageant, I told them that I find her answer okay considering the context of the pageant itself. On the other hand, I also told them that I am not satisfied with the answer on a personal level and said that if I were to answer the question, I won't imply any religious bias because I believe that even love could transcend beyond religious boundaries (Yes I am a sucker for true love like that. Blame Dumbledore), After like a minute of silence-- I think they were still tipsy to masticate my choice of words-- Ex Seminarian, in what seemed to be in protest, told me he was shocked and asked me if whether or not God is important in my life.

Photo courtesy of Science and Philosophy

So there I was again, in the spotlight where my belief system was in question. I bluntly revealed to them that I think I am a Deist and explained to them that I think there is a Supreme Cosmological Being somewhere up there but I think he is apathetic on his creation, letting the Laws of Nature to carry its natural process. (There were a lot of time spent enlightening their confused faces on the meaning of "apathy" and discussing the Deism concept, but let's not go into that). They were shocked in confusion on my revelation and they think that I am someone turning evil. Well, they didin't explicitly said that but it was painted all over their faces. The worse thing is that I see Ex-Seminarian's face reeking judgment and for a second I thought he was about to exorcise me right there and then.

My belief system is something I deem personal-- it was something that I wouldn't want to talk about during social events. Firstly, most of my friends, especially in HS, are Theists or at least were raised as such. This whole Deism thing is relatively new for me and I am just exploring the possibility that I might be one. With all these RH Bill advocacy and fighting for gay rights, I am in a stage where I am questioning the belief system imposed upon me while growing up. So as far as my HS classmates are now concerned, I am religiously deviant.

Honestly speaking, with my active online participation, being active on these advocacy, paying occasional visits in the Filipino Freethinkers FB page and all these conversation I had and am having with my friends, I don't care if my HS classmates judge me for what I believe in-- or judge me, at least on my way of answering Shamcey's question. Call me deviant but I don't really care. After all, what is important is that I know that I have an open mind, that I try to use reason to understand things and most of all, I don't judge as quickly as them. After all, I believe that to each his own (Although I think that such is a double-edged sword).