Lenten Blog – Day 35 – Searching for Truth – 2 + 2 = 5

Holy Week is starting and I’m six blogs away from finishing this path that I’m on. I really didn’t think I’d last this long, to be honest. I figured I’d peter-out about 20 and come up with some excuse or realize that no one was actually reading them and quit writing them, so no loss anyway, right? If a blog in the blogosphere doesn’t get read, does it truly exist?

And now, with Holy Week underway I’m scrambling to find some morsels of something in the recesses of my brain cupboard. All I’m finding is out-of-date soup. But even soup is something, unless it’s cream of mushroom.

So why not handle “Truth.”

I know within the next few days I’m going to be bombarded with a bunch of images and stories and rituals and church services. The images and stories and rituals and church services will collide in my brain like they have in the past and I will question and I will nod and I will reason and I will ask and I will confirm and I will shake my head and I will rationalize and I will wonder a basic question: Did it all really happen? Is it true? What is the truth?

If I type 2+2=5 your brain snaps. You know that 2+2 does not equal 5. It’s not true. You know this because you were taught from a young age about numbers. Whether by your parents or a teacher or your older sibling who pointed out that HE got FIVE pieces of candy and you only got FOUR. There’s something about 2+2=4 that rings true to you. What if you discovered some ancient tribe and 2+2=bogsnap to them. Bogsnap would be true to them and not to you and 4 would be true to you, but not to them. So which one is true? Can you both be true? And where does that truth come from?

"They’re over there with their picnic basket."  As an editor, I see that this sentence is correct. But if you start messing with the their, there, they’re and getting them out of order, my brain will attempt to put them in the correct order. “Their over they’re with there picnic basket” is so out of whack, WORD wants me to fix it. Even a dumb word processing program knows what is true or not - at least when it comes to editing.  An "editorial truth" if you will.

Still, what I’m trying to get to, is what is it about our brains that say “aha!” to this and “nu-uh” to that? I’m sure therapists and psychologists, etc. have some general understanding of basic comprehension when your brain acknowledges that something is correct and true and when your brain doesn’t. It’s like I’ve written in previous blogs about logic. There are some things in Christ’s journey to the cross where it rings true but then there are logic gaps that make me question. Maybe that’s why I continue to focus on the political aspect of this path that Christ is on - because it makes logical sense. Man is on a path, man talks of love and peace and fighting the good fight, man gathers followers, man journeys to Jerusalem where he is seen as a threat to the governing authority and is arrested, tortured and put to death only to rise again in three days.

As logical, or illogical, as that may be, there’s still something about it that “rings true” for me. Even while I question and search and rationalize and look deep into myself and my psyche I can’t help but wonder if it rings true because that was what I was taught. That’s how I was raised. That’s what I learned. 2+2=4. Jesus died and rose from the dead three days later.

Is it true because it's true?  Or is it true because someone said it was true?  Or do I take it on faith?