I used to have some really interesting discussions with a couple of guys at work. Both were regular churchgoers and Christians, though they often disagreed with each other on certain religious points. How often they disagreed fascinated me, since they both believed in Jesus and the Bible and had their sabbath on Saturday; I just couldn’t figure out how they could have such heated debates on the specifics of their faith.

In fact, they seemed to agree only when I joined the discussion.

I’m not exactly an agnostic, but I’m close to it. I believe that there are things we can not and probably will never know or understand, and if there is a higher power out there (and I sometimes think there is!), it is something that we cannot fully grasp, name, or describe in our language. In our human attempt to do so, we instead come up with our various interpretations of what we perceive to be the truth—i.e., Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc.

But that is not my point, and I am not looking to be converted or to be led into a religious debate. My point is when I joined their discussions, they no longer disagreed with each other, and instead they sought to educate me on their faith as I posed questions to them that challenged their beliefs. When I played the devil’s advocate and compared their faith to the Islamic faith or to the Jewish faith, they argued with feeling that Jesus was the only true faith/religion/prophet/savior.

They were so full of conviction, I was frankly amazed. I understand that this is how faith works, but I still had to ask, “How can you be so sure?”

And the response I got was something like, “If Jesus lied, then everything else is a lie.” Which confused me only further.

It makes me think of Boy George. Yes, Boy George, and I don’t mean to say that he is in any way a prophet or a savior. For me, Boy George is a symbol of conviction because he triggers a memory of me and my cousin Anthony in a heated debate as we sat in the back seat of my Aunt’s car on the way to school.

I was maybe 11, and Anthony was 9. Karma Chameleon played on the radio, and it was the first time I’d ever heard it. Anthony, on the other hand, had heard it the night before while it was performed on TV.

“That’s a girl singing that,” he said, and I frowned as I listened to the lyrics and tenor voice.

“No, it’s not,” I argued. “That’s a man.”

“No way. I saw her on TV last night. That’s definitely a girl.”

“He’s singing, ‘I’m a man without conviction.’ It’s got to be a man.”

“It’s a woman!”

“It’s a man!”

Back and forth we argued over this until we were in a yelling match and my aunt had to threaten to stop the car. Angry and righteous, we both thought we were right and the other person was wrong; we were absolutely sure of it, and never did it even occur to us to agree to disagree or to find out more about this person before proceeding so we could settle our debate.

If our situations had been reversed, we probably would have argued differently, with him stating that the singer was a man and with me stating it was a woman. But I hadn’t seen Boy George’s long hair, make-up, or flowing dress, and Anthony didn’t have just the lyrics and voice upon which to base his opinions. We could only rely on our own perceptions and information, warped and incomplete as they were.

Was it ever a shock later on to find out the truth! It made me realize that we cannot know enough to have so much conviction. We cannot always be so sure.

And so I remain a woman without conviction. I am near useless in a debate, most especially when I don’t have all the facts. I always end up asking, “Well, what if?” instead of properly sticking with an argument. It makes me wonder how anyone can be so sure of anything or everything—so certain in their beliefs that they would actually go to war for them.

Is it just me, or does it not make sense?

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