Quotes About Doubt

My coming to faith did not start with a leap but rather a series of staggers from what seemed like one safe place to another. Like lily pads, round and green, these places summoned and then held me up while I grew. Each prepared me for the next leaf on which I would land, and in this way I moved across the swamp of doubt and fear.

The reason I never give up hope is because everything is so basically hopeless.

I have a lot of faith. But I am also afraid a lot, and have no real certainty about anything. I remembered something Father Tom had told me--that the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. Certainty is missing the point entirely. Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns.

Before, the woods had always done so much for me. Once I could actually go out into the woods and communicate with God, or Nature or something. Now that something didn't come through. It was just not there anymore. More than ever I began to wonder whether God actually existed. Maybe God changed as the individual changed, or perhaps grew as one grew.

I broke with my religion in college.

People who cease to believe in God or goodness altogether still believe in the devil... Evil is always possible. And goodness is eternally difficult.

But I can't. Need is not quite belief.

Probably I am a fool…most poets are fools…but for some reason I love faith, but have none.

Who are they" "Fallen angels who were not good enough to be saved, nor bad enough to be lost" say the peasantry.

You don't believe in God, Rachel. You don't believe in goodness or love or mercy, do you?" "I haven't seen enough to form an opinion." "But you believe in the devil?" "When I'm sitting in a car with him, yes," she said.

Had she punished him enough? How could she be sure?

She wasn't sure she WANTED to live happily ever after.

She had believed that because someone needed saving they were savable.

That was the point where she was supposed to sound tough, like she was someone to be reckoned with, like she was the sort of person witches should listen to. Was this really her plan? She sounded like a child.

But you do not need to believe in something to be afraid of it.

Merci d'avoir fait le premier pas vers nos retrouvailles, car de mon côté, plus les jours passaient et moins j'osais.

the Self-Loathing League.

What was I waiting for? For signs and miracles, stars on the firmament..?

suspiciously.

want to, you say it's not a good idea." She shook her head. Grown-

When someone asks you about a coin they flipped four times, there is a correct answer: "I'm not sure.

Forcing ourselves to express how sure we are of our beliefs brings to plain sight the probabilistic nature of those beliefs, that what we believe is almost never 100% or 0% accurate but, rather, somewhere in between.

Why might my belief not be true? What other evidence might be out there bearing on my belief? Are there similar areas I can look toward to gauge whether similar beliefs to mine are true? What sources of information could I have missed or minimized on the way to reaching my belief? What are the reasons someone else could have a different belief, what's their support, and why might they be right instead of me? What other perspectives are there as to why things turned out the way they did?

If our only options are being 100% right or 100% wrong, with nothing in between, then information that potentially contradicts a belief requires a total downgrade, from right all the way to wrong. There is no "somewhat less sure" option in an all-or-nothing world, so we ignore or discredit the information to hold steadfast in our belief.