Christian Light or Colin'ism
How do I respond when confronted by a friend who is heavily steeped in the Christian faith? I often take the soft approach and share how I attended Catholic Church growing up and later changed to Unitarian Universalist (UU) church. I embrace many Christian values such as love your neighbor, avoid lying and stealing, and help the needy. Hell, I even buy into turning the other cheek when someone slaps me. My beliefs start to veer away from traditional Christianity when asked about the afterlife. My soft answer goes something like: “Heaven and hell are states of mind that we experience during life. We can cultivate a heavenly, peaceful, and loving existence. On the other hand, life can be horrible, sad, cruel, and lonely. Once our body dies, our mind ceases to exist.” I admit, this is not very comforting, and extinguishes the hope of seeing our dead, loved ones in the afterlife. (All we have are memories.) My ability to remain Christian light gets even more difficult when asked if I b