Some say that our faith in God is based on made-up principles and stories that have been used to control human beings over the centuries. Others say that religion is like a drug that allows us to see what we can't understand about our existence. People of faith are sometimes viewed as weak in their fear of death and the need of something to help them understand their mortality. The fact that religion is sometimes practiced and preached for the wrong reasons, however, speaks more to the sinful nature of man than to it's truth.
We are beautiful and complicated creations of a loving God that wants us to love Him back. Unlike the animals He created, He chose to give us the gifts of reason and free will. He doesn't force us to love Him, but he is always there when we turn to Him for love and support. The pain that this gift of life sometimes gives us is negligible in His sight for He created us out of His love, loves us in our natural life, and will keep us in His love when we are finished in this mortal gift. If we can understand His love in this way, we can achieve His comfort and joy in this worldly life.
In The Heart of Christianity, Marcus Borg uses a metaphor from Celtic Christianity, "thin places", to describe those places and situations in life that are, "a means whereby the sacred becomes present to us.......a means of grace." Thin places could be physical locations as well as people, the arts, times of illness, and suffering.
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