Religion and faith are two very different things

Religion is an ideology, It's a set of stories that one believes in because,

because

because it's how their ancestors learned to accept the things in the world they could not understand.

They created stories to rationalize how the earth was made, why it spun.

They imagined an afterlife that helped to calm their fear of death.

Instead of an end, death simply became the beginning of something else.

Religion is committing one's self to believe in a specific set of stories because

because

because they make the most sense to us.

Religion is a community. A family who share those common stories and come together to celebrate the truth they all believe.

But faith,

Faith is personal. 

 

You see religion defines what you believe, lays it out as fact.

But Faith is your relationship with what you believe.

It's how you feel and how passionate you are about those stories. 

It's the because.

It's a private affair that is meant for no mind but your own.

and it can be practiced anywhere.

You don't need a church, temple, or synagogue to have faith.

You need only yourself and what you believe to be true. 

 

Religion is nothing without faith.

Just pages and pages of stories written hundreds of years ago.

A made-up history book.

but faith is the because.

It's they why's and how's.

it's the color that brings the stories to life

the air that allows truth to leap off those pages.

 

Your faith is your faith

there is no reason as to why

and there does not need to be.

Faith does not need justification,

it is the justification.