Faith and self conflict

Fast forward a few more years and I'm a second year college student who has lost or feels like I am in the process of losing most of the things that really matter to me. I'm so depressed and anxious that I'm losing the ability to even function as a person. I haven't made it to a class yet this semester because I'm trying to work part time and I'm now suffering from horrible insomnia and only sleep around the time that I'm actually supposed to be in class. I barely even leave my bed at this point when I'm in my college town. As I type this I'm milking a minor surgery to avoid going back to my college town, which is only made harder by the fact that my ex who was practically living with me last semester and is also one of my best friends, has broken up with me and is kind of avoiding me right now. She's one of the only people I can talk to about anything because she suffers from a lot of the same problems as I do. Earlier in high school, she was a staunch agnostic and also one of my only leftist friends, so I took her seriously last summer when she wanted me to check out her church with her.

It's run by the family of one of our smartest, most over achieving friends and some of our other close friends attend and supported the idea. It's non denominational, and I originally went out of curiosity and a desire to support them and show appreciation that they invited me and wanted to know my thoughts on it. I went in expecting not to hate it because I knew that if those particular friends went there, it was at the very least not as bad as some of the others I had attended. I did not expect myself to continue to go back week after week willingly, but I have, even since the beginning of the new semester. I now find my mental health in worse shape than it has ever been and I'm experiencing a lot of the problems I have always experienced with religion. I've become a person skeptical towards most things I can not actively see and touch. Every Sunday morning I wonder if I'm just becoming a more bitter and cynical person because I can't force myself to have faith in anything. If only I could experience some undoubtable proof or example of a miracle I feel like it could keep me going enough to really start to believe the things they tell me every week. I just can't FEEL anything. I want to experience these feelings and ideas that my friends are apparently having so often. I feel they are too smart and too honest to fake or exaggerate their claims and their tears that come out of their faith. The closest I feel I ever really get is thinking that a line or two of the service speaks to me and my own particular problems. 3/5?

>>2324193
get on some antidepressants. Jesus Christ, if this isn't a classic case of depression I don't know what is. I'm not even going to get into the rest of this, just go see a psych. You have an illness and it needs to be treated with as much force as possible. If you feel like you should also go to church, then go. It can provide a good community to socialize and get away from isolation that is feeding your depression.

Last Sunday there was some level of church wide experience and the service lasted over an hour longer than usual. I stayed out of respect for my friends who were all in the group that stayed behind the entire time and internally nearly begged for some kind of sign. When one of my friends asked me if I wanted her to tell me why is was that I had stayed with them, I answered a quick no and tried to keep my voice from breaking. I'm afraid that I'm only disappointing the people closest to me as much as I am myself. I don't mean to have any internal hesitance, they say that people who aren't truly saved shouldn't yet take communion, so I abstain from that among other things.

Am I only stunting any chance at growth by keeping my distance from those things? Why can't I find some source of faith like so many of my friends have? I go from wild shifts between numbness and absolute misery and a sense of isolation. I don't want to even be alive but I'm horribly uncomfortable with the idea of not having any closure with my friends. I know that if I do kill myself that they would feel responsible, like they haven't done enough, when in reality I think they're the only reason I'm alive now. Why do I feel as broken spiritually as I do mentally? Why can't I have faith in anything? Am I delusional? Am I being punished by god for questioning everything to begin with? Am I an awful selfish human being for having some kind of hope and expectation of experiencing something? How did you find faith? How does one keep it? 5/5

>>2324223
I know that my depression is one of my major problems. I didn't mean to build a wall of text or focus so much on the depression itself, only to give background on how I ended up in the situation I'm in. I'd like to discuss internal conflict and a lot of things I'm confused and conflicted about in religion. Maybe with some catholic anons. The ones I encounter online seem to all have a deeper understanding of scripture than the Protestants I'm surrounded by. Catholics make up maybe two percent of the population in the bottom half of my state and the only thing I knew about them growing up is "They think they can do anything as long as they repent on Sunday". If nothing else I'm sure that's a highly inaccurate assessment of them. From what I can tell it's just that Catholics don't feel the need to quit church when they're in a bad place like Protestants do.

>>2324322
Well, I'm a protestant, but I do know a lot about scripture and theology. I was in a baptist college with every intention of becoming a pastor or missionary, but was sat down by a professor and told that I am a horrible public speaker and god gave me a gift that would better lend me to a scientific career.

>"They think they can do anything as long as they repent on Sunday
Same can be said of protestants as long as you replace Sunday with anytime. One thing that runs deep in Christianity is asking forgiveness, the divide comes from if you directly ask or go through an intermediary. Both protestants and catholics believe in repentance, trying to live a better life with less sin.

My personal opinion on why your last statement is that protestants believe in a more personal relationship with jesus, which means they don't have to go to church all the time, especially when they feel out of it. Though that doesn't mean I haven't met a lot of people in my own church who have their hard times and keep going.

>>2324257
Same anon here again

You are sick, and you need help. You aren't being punished by god anymore than when you get the flu. An early theologian of the church, Augustine, believed these kind of things were ways of god to help us grow and learn. I can't tell you how to find faith yourself, its a personal thing really. For me, it was an outlet for my own sorrow and a way to keep going. I find god in the world around me and science. I will repeat what I said earlier, get help. Get on antidepressants, confide in these people who care about you and you care about. A lot of the new testament talks about how important community is. If you want a more narrow place to read from, read romans.

>>2324363
What are your thoughts on my seeming inability to find any real sense of faith? Is it something I'm doing wrong? Or not doing? I kind of want to read scripture but I'm afraid any independent study will only push me further away. Should I consider actually opening up to the church leaders about my concerns? Like I said, my friend group is really close to the family that runs it and a part of me is afraid that even talking to them about it will make them want to push me away to keep me from being a threat to everyone else's convictions.

On a related note, what are your thoughts on taking scripture as a literal historical account? I've heard that different members of the church I attend take different positions on it but I've only ever asked the one friend about it. Things like the age of the universe and evolution are a big part of what pushed me away from religion to begin with. I've heard some people say that it must be taken literally because Jesus's heritage is traced from one person to another all the way to at least Abraham, maybe to Adam? Which reminds me, I thought that Jews traced their blood line through their mothers, not their fathers? Which would seem to be especially important in the case of Jesus, given his divine parentage.

>>2324389
>Should I open up to the leaders of an organization that actively fosters belief in their religion?
bruh

On a more serious note, I would say yes. I can't speak for your specific church, but 99% will actively help you with these kind of things. You shouldn't worry about a church leader thinking like that. It is really something that has come out of an anti-theist angst. I can't speak for Catholics as I have never been part of a catholic church, but I know protestants will have sessions of group bible study outside of Sunday mornings. Maybe ask around if there is something like that at the church you have been going to.

Bible as historical account, it depends. I know I tend to be on the more allegorical instead of historical side, but there are things like kings and judges that are possibly historical. Though that is still debatable, as evidence of that time period is scarce to say the least. On the genealogy, there is a lot happening that isn't necessarily obvious at face value. First is that it is important to link Jesus through the line of David, Abraham, Isaac, etc. because those are very important figures. Second is that ancient Hebrews recorded their genealogy through the name of the men, even though as you said it is suppose to matrilineal. The importance of the blood line through the mother is that it is the only way to be 100% sure that the child is in fact of a jewish bloodline.

Anon, what if they are merely pretending?

>>2324372
I'm trying to work some kind of issue on my health insurance out before I get back to school. If that works out, I'm going to visit my university's dedicated mental health clinic if I can find the motivation to go in and speak to a total stranger about my impending meltdown. I guess worst case scenario, it will be good to have on record if I end up failing this semester. My friend that mentioned might be willing to go over there with me, goodness knows I've dragged her to a doctor more than once when she went was emotionally catatonic and about to fail out.

why are you so worried? did you do a lot of sin?

>>2324436
I know this is a troll comment, but I honestly cannot see a world where at the very least three of these five friends would just make up their experiences, for several reasons. Two of the five are extremely intelligent people who jag their own issues with whether or not some interpretations are supposed to be literal and the implications this would have on science. One of them I'm sure would actively be atheist if not for these experiences and has her own questions about morality as it is. The fact that I do believe that they at least believe that their experience are genuine really creates more problems than answers for me though. Because if I apply that reasoning to them, I have to be willing to apply it to the couple billion people who are all more or less convinced that they can or have had these kind of experiences too. Even the ones who practice entirely different religions. ESPECIALLY those people. I don't think that any amount of desire for community, immunity, or cultural pressure could have such an effect.