Just In Case

(Excerpt from the 1855 preface to Whitman's Leaves of Grass.)

"...hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown..."

Thinker and poet Walt Whitman wrote about our many human contradictions, the personal traits that make no sense, that seem so opposite and impossible. Being a resigned agnostic who prays, for example. Or, being a questioning explorer of the boundaries of science and faith, how they both share a long, confusing border of reason, beliefs, facts, and emotions.

A dad for two decades now, I'm still asking myself what is the best way to help my young son understand his own contradictions, or impulses that may shape his choices and even outcomes. 

After Hebrew school, Bar Mitzva, and me talking about the Commandments, he's a young adult now. We always have frank conversations, so he knows my agnostic traits, and that my praying is contrary to my doubting, still a part of my own inner life I cannot explain. 

The fact that I want there to be a just God, in control, all-powerful, all-good, that's still reason for me to continue a lifelong dialogue that benefits in other ways. Mostly unknown, but palpable, healing beyond question, repairing what the world does daily, wearing down of hope, the unfathomable depths of despair and mortal pain so intrinsic to this physical existence. 

Maybe I pray just in case, because there's so much I cannot confirm, so many mysteries, enough for a universe, so much splendor and beauty in this world, so what's the worst? That I have wasted my time only in dialogue with myself? That's not so bad, after all, as these strange contradictions that Whitman celebrated are re-discovered by each generation, just as my son will find his own way beyond my direction.