Walking Alongside Despair

I am no saint. In fact, I totally understood what Paul meant when he called himself the chief of sinners - I see myself as one. When one find himself alone with God and see him face to face, one can't help but despair over the sins that perpetuate the entire being of himself. It's like a sickly coat of oil permanently coated on the entire surface of oneself, a condition that one is forever trap with while in existence.

This constant consciousness about my sinful, worldly nature has been throughout the day in my life. At my most blissful moment, or my most depressed hour, I can't help but being aware of the absurdity and meaninglessness of 'life' as we know it. The persistent sense of despair can be a really heavy burden to bear as I stagger through this particular life of mine. It is incredibly tempting to just let go off everything and indulge myself either in a life of hedonism and aesthetism, or one of piety and the practise of communal submission to a religious code. To withdraw into bad faith, as Sartre calls it. But I have grown too acutely aware of the despair over my own state of existence to live a life of ignorance.

But to live a life defined by actions, acted upon choices which have no certainties, or based on any established consensual guidelines/protocol, is a terrifying thought in itself. Kierkegaard affirms that faith is the solution to despair, but faith require so much courage and risks that I can't help but feeling the burden of the freedom over the choices and course of my own life. Imagine, to be condemned to freedom!

And to know that this is the life I will live for the rest of my 'life'... I guess Christ was right when he said that small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life. Truth is the gate is much smaller and the road is much narrower than most of us have imagined it to be. Not to mention incredibly lonely as one is completely cut off from other fellow humans in this long arduous journey, with only Christ's promises as comfort.

This is merely the beginning...

Christianity does not join people together. No, it separates them - in order to unite every single individual with God. And when a person become such that he can belong to God and to God alone, he has died away from that which usually joins people together.

- Soren Kierkegaard