To be or not to be religious. The ultimate conundrum has followed me for years as I’ve aged. I grew up with religious Muslim parents, good people with strict beliefs who vouched for the Glory of God and the importance of walking the straight path.
Boring was the enemy of God with its hedonistic implicates, but as I moved out, I saw the world. I began to question belief as a skill, seeing it more as having black or blonde hair. This leads to the obvious: an existential crisis.
An existential crisis is a period of inner conflict during which a person is distraught over questions about identity, meaning and purpose.
Remember when you questioned the reasoning behind going to work, being motivated, or living in general? Sure, you need money to live, motivation to continue, etc.
Beyond our worldly matters, what is there to live for? Why are we here alone in the universe?
Could it be romantic love and the journey it takes you on? Maybe financial elevation, virtuous aims, hedonistic pleasure? Frankly, who knows? This is where the religion tells you the “truth.” But hey, good for them for finding truth in a world of consumerism, war and crookery. Most people settle on the best balance to remain relevant and functional in society.
There are many ways you could go about this. One could argue any belief held is a delusion when measured against the entirety of the cosmos and human history. Our beliefs in a vacuum are elementary and cemented in a strong, yet cute thing called belief. The science of today ages with growing innovation, and people will die never knowing their trusted beliefs are wrong.
The framework of monotheistic religion is held together by the belief of the unseen; without it, there’s not much left for you to take away except some moral guidelines. But that begs the question of assessing the value of moral structures built upon the words of the unseen and unproven. To the believer, the value is beyond worldly possession. For others, it’s an archaic version of progressive virtue.
How could there not be a God? After all, if you stretched your veins, capillaries, and arteries, you would have 60,000 miles of rope; Boy Scouts would be thrilled.
The type of person you are will likely determine your religiosity. Religion might call you a little louder if you are comfortable making decisions a priori without experience or evidence. On the contrary, if you are comfortable making decisions a posteriori, you would need evidence or first-hand experience to believe.
We have a series of points in our lives where, for whatever reason, we re-examine our existential beliefs. Our friends, environment and family all contribute, but in the deepest crevices of our minds, we tend to doubt or reimagine our projected beliefs.
Should you be religious? Well, according to Pascal’s Wager, yes. Simply put, Blaise Pascal’s beloved belief in God, at worst, wastes your time.

Keep in mind this depends on singling out the “right religion,” but a religious person inherently believes their faith is the truth. This contentment could be why religious people seem happier, have longer lives and consume less alcohol. In case my non-religious readers need a nugget of hope, Pew Research did find that being unaffiliated with religion did result in lower obesity rates.
Aside from the obesity rates, I doubt the claims of happiness and lessened drug use. After all, veering from the message of God might be hard to admit and resurface repressed cognitive dissonance.
It could all be a delusion, but I remember hearing there was a fine line between delusion and confidence. The balance to maintain faith is beyond your regular American Ninja Warrior course. With over 10,000 religions worldwide, walking the tightrope of faith without distraction is truly marvelous work.
Faith aside, morality is a two-lane highway with the righteous on the right, fueled by the wishes of the Lord. Self-chosen worldly expectations of virtue fuel the non-religious coasts along the left lane. Be better and be grateful that religious punishments are not instituted in the Western world because, with 3000 burglaries a day, there’d be a lot of chopped-up hands. Maybe it’d lower robbery rates, but I’ll let the alternate universe find out.
It’s foolish to say that religious people maintain proper conduct because of their religious beliefs. To Friedrich Nietzsche, it was the opposite. Nietzche saw the decline of Christianity in the 19th century as the beginning of the end of Western society. I agree with the notion, and if you’ve ever heard the term judeo-Christian values, you know why. The west was built on the Christian ethic, just as the Middle East was built upon Islamic ethics.
Are we ready to separate religion from our moral structure? The conservative view tells us religion is deeply intertwined in our country’s framework beyond “all men are created equal.” It only really comes up when discussing the moral integrity of our country’s history as a hypocritical contradiction to our self-appointed moral supremacy. The question is above my pay grade, but forget you have been a poor, little Issac about to be slaughtered until the Grace of God saved him.
Mohammad Tantawi is a 24-year-old mass communication senior from Smyrna, Tenn.