Figurines of the Virgin Mary
Religion wasn't a central theme in the house where I grew up. Not that it was entirely absent, but if my parents were fervent Catholics, they concealed it well, and they certainly didn't impose it on me.
I can vaguely remember there were crucifixes in some of the rooms, figurines of the Virgin Mary and other saintly characters on shelves, and framed images and paintings that either depicted holy scenes, or at least evoked the sacred. And there was also this peculiar Jesus Christ Wanted Dead or Alive poster that struck me as compelling in a subversive kind of way at the time.
On festive occasions, when all the children were present, or when we had guests, my father gave thanks at the beginning of the meals, and we all made the sign of the cross at the end of the prayer. But otherwise, I don't recollect us praying, except before going to bed. We used to recite the same verse I was surprised to hear again upon discovering Metallica's Enter Sandman :
« Now I lay me down to sleep,
Pray the Lord my soul to keep,
If I die before I wake,
Pray the Lord my soul to take. »
We had catechism class throughout elementary school. Attending church on Sundays was a compulsory observance, and I wasn't particularly fond of it, deeming the ceremonies tedious and protracted. I would often try to come up with reasons for not going, although I think I complied anyhow, usually if not always.
And basically, that was it. I don't recall being preached to nor lectured at home, or not in relation to those questions at any rate. Perhaps it was different for my siblings, but I was pretty much left to my own devices regarding spiritual matters.
I have clear memories of one specific week when I was sick and missed school. I must have been seven or eight years old. There was a copy of the New Testament on the desk in my bedroom, and I eventually grabbed it and read large parts of it, out of boredom at first, and then with curiosity. In retrospect, I'm quite sure the experience influenced me given my young age, yet it manifestly didn't turn me into a devout faithful.
A few years later, a priest visited our school. At some point during his speech, he asked us to write down one of the things we would like God to assist us with, or something along those lines. My request was that he would help us develop our individual aptitudes, so that we could become better persons. But when the clergyman delivered it out loud in front of the whole group, he said he didn't understand my suggestion. As it seemed simple enough to me already, I didn't bother to explain. Probably, that contributed to my general impression that religion was not for me at the time.
For Weddings and Funerals
After elementary school was over, attending mass wasn't required anymore. Catechism class was still mandatory up until the equivalent of grade eleven or so. Possibly was it before that, but I can't remember precisely.
My family stopped going to church altogether, except for Midnight Mass at Christmas, and occasions such as weddings and funerals. I never inquired about the official justification, but I came to the conclusion that my parents had been going mainly to accompany my sister and I, and now that it was optional insofar as our academic curriculum was concerned, their principal motivation was gone.
From then on, my world remained nearly completely devoid of spiritual preoccupations and activities for many years. They would only resurface much later.
Beer is the Mind-Killer
When I was studying electrical engineering at Université Laval, I subscribed to the view that religion was the refuge of uneducated people who lived in the past, apparently unaware of the recent discoveries of science. In my opinion, their beliefs were crutches to which those folks held on dearly for lack of a more sophisticated way of dealing with reality.
Interestingly enough, in hindsight I recognize that this corresponds to the period when I was at my most dissolute. I was in my twenties, and I used to drink excessive amounts of beer and pull quantity of other dishonourable deeds that I would now qualify as missing the mark by more than a fair margin. I'm certain I kept on paying a price for those mistakes, long after I committed them, primarily in terms of harbouring a delinquent, paranoid stance on life. Yet, evidently, I didn't know better at the time.
While I don't recall considering myself an atheist, I was convinced that there could be no such thing as a God and that religions were thus all intrinsically flawed. I obviously had doubts though. My then reason-based approach, as laudable as some might have claimed it to be, just wasn't equipped to properly address the most fundamental problems of existence.
Remover of Obstacles
Thanks to a girl friend who one evening wore a t-shirt she had brought back from Sri Lanka, and which featured a depiction of Ganesha, the elephant-headed deity widely revered as the Remover of Obstacles, and the Lord of Beginnings, I eventually chanced upon Buddhist philosophy. It immediately attracted me because of its numerous similarities with reflections about my own inner workings that I had been entertaining ever since attending a graduate class on neural networks.
Following that fateful finding in the mid-nineties, I decided to study Buddhism and to adopt some of its practices. I acquired a version of the Dhammapada, an initiatory collection of aphorisms attributed to the Buddha. This primer provided many pointers on the culture, and references to other documents that I also read later on. I experimented with meditation and reciting mantras, and they became part of my daily routine. I even transferred a few of those especially insightful scriptures to electronic format during the introductory years.
In parallel, I explored other avenues, including computer programming, music and the arts in general, and psychology and physics, through which I learned about the endeavours of pioneers such as Carl Jung and David Bohm. It is while perusing the writings of the latter that I ultimately stumbled upon the seed of what developed into the unorthodox perspective on the matter of error, and some of its related notions, that I share via this essay.
Through Different Eyes
While I was manifestly exposed to Christian influence in the course of my childhood, my observations on the issue of liberation thus principally come from a non-Christian point of view.
In the following section, I first state the traditional explanations of sin and hell as they have been presented to me, and I contrast the core concepts with alternative interpretations. Using these new meanings, I then propose a different take on the question, one that better describes how things appear to me when seen from where my hybrid trajectory in the worlds of arts, science, and Oriental philosophy has led me.
