UNWRITTEN RULES

Tony LaRusa: "I heard he said something like, 'I play my game.' No he doesn't. He plays the game of Major League Baseball."

I’ve talked a great deal on the detrimental effects of the theist concept of belief. How it is typically used as a way of limiting the great wonders of the world to a level of hedonistic understanding in order to free us from the existential angst of the Unknown. How it is used to enslave people in a type of impulsive participation, feeding off the hidden structures of desire. But I also don’t claim to be an atheist, a non-believer, because this opposing position is just as controlled, except this group has reduced the entire thing to the control of a lifeless machine. A true atheist could only enter nihilism and despair, but most atheists don’t. They typically just replace the sacred object of desire with something secular; most commonly, commodity satisfaction. But there is a third position, which is the position I take up when I am asked about belief. If asked, for example, "do you believe in Jesus?" I’d say "I believe in the story of Jesus like I believe in the story of Rocky," through the lens of the third position of belief, and that is suspended disbelief. This doesn’t satisfy the listener and at first seems like a flippant or deflecting response, or a less committed position than belief or non-belief. But I assure you it is not. The third position is a commitment, but it’s a commitment to the Ineffable Mystery, rather than to some finite description. It’s where the power of a story doesn’t depend on its literal facticity, but on the willingness to let it move you. I don’t need to believe Rocky existed when I watch the movie, I also don’t sit there and say “this guy doesn’t exist,” for I would have no chance to enjoy the movie. So what do I do? Knowing that “belief” and “disbelief” sedate my life in some way, I instead suspend my disbelief and I cry with joy. I am able to experience the message, hear the call, and allow the Real to speak. Life is the same. At the point of being asked to “believe” anything you have three choices, (1) belief: literally trick yourself into thinking it’s true (this eliminates faith) (2) disbelief: literally trick yourself into thinking it’s false (this eliminates meaning) or (3) suspended disbelief: let go of the need to grasp it as true or false all together but choose to participate nonetheless (the faith position). Jean-Paul Sartre uses the term “bad faith” for the first two positions, in which we are willing to so quickly engage in self-deception about the world. We forget, in a sense, that we’re all just playing a game of contradiction, it’s just whether you're an unwitting (belief), unwilling (non-belief) or willing (suspended disbelief) participant.