jewels

Although faith generally refers to a theological belief system, I wonder if it is something else. Yes, I get that religion relies on faith to shepherd believers. But people are always telling others to "have a little faith" when it comes to waiting for actions of others, and not every one of these users of the word affiliate with any particular god or religion.

If, by that meager analysis, one can assume that faith is merely trust, must you have that if you don't have a god? Is there something that controls your fate that you should blindly believe? Does everyone have to have something to believe in to survive? If you have belief in yourself, can you consider that as having faith? If you trust no one, do you not have faith? Isn't faith a belief in something/someone with no proof? Is faith immoral?

For me, Faith is one of those words I have difficulty separating from reliogiosity (not a word, right?) even when it comes to humanity itself. There are people that I feel have earned my trust, but there is not one person who has my blind faith (redundant phrase, ya?) . It's all been earned but is easily lost.

So when I'm hoping for a particular outcome to a life situation and someone tells me to "have faith", I can only base the actual outcome on my efforts, the situation and any parties or objects related to that outcome. In that case, I would have faith in myself.

But if it's a situation over which I had no control but had hopes for an outcome for a particular person, it would seem that would mean I'd have to trust that specific person to have earned that outcome. Or maybe fate = luck?

Your thoughts and opinions?

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We are always more anxious to be distinguished for a talent which we do not possess, than to be praised for the fifteen which we do possess.
Mark Twain