Week 2: Religion and Moral Identity

Week 2: Religion and Moral Identity


Can we be good without God? Wow what a question!! This question has stumped me. I was raised to believe in God and to follow the bible. That is just how things are at least in my life.

After careful thought, I think it depends on how a person is raised. If a person is raised with good morals and taught what is right and what is wrong, then that person will find their way in search of a higher power.

When I was a child, I had no idea what God was. That word left a big question mark above my head even though my parents had open discussion. I did not understand why I had to learn different prayers and scriptures. They made no sense to me, even after my Catechism teacher explained the meanings. The only correlation I had was my name. My mother named me after the Blessed Mother. (I learned later the reason for my name is because of tradition. For several generations, there were no girls born in my family. The mothers would pray to the Blessed Mother to bless them with a baby girl. Finally a girl was born, and the tradition began. From that point on the first girl was named Mary. I am the third generation to be named.)

Being raised with a religion in my life, I only began to have faith to believe in God when I was a teenager. My father died when I was fifteen. I began to believe there was a God due to the circumstances. I did not know how to deal with so much sadness and grief. I felt I needed to be strong for my family. I felt weak when I would cry myself to sleep every night. I finally began to pray to God to take this pain away or to somehow make it easier to live. In time this pain got easier. From time to time I do feel sad, but I remember that everything will be ok.