The Dark Side of the Faith

May the Force Be With You. TM
       And also with you.

The genius of the Force
Is that it can be read so many ways:

It's an energy field
Created by life,
Not creating it. 
It isn't just light
It is darkness too. - 
A self-contained, 
Ying-yang
Sci-fi-fantasy
Dualism. 

But not God, 
or even a god. 

At a glance, the Force has nothing to do with faith.

The Force is not God.
But neither is Faith. 
If I say "May the Faith Be With You,"
     (And also with you.)
Maybe I'm saying the same thing. 

Because Faith is not an absolute good. 
Ask Jesus, who was killed in part by over-zealous faith. 

Faith, as anyone with a mind that thinks
Will realize, has a light side and a dark side too.

Faith serves, 
Feeds the hungry, 
Welcomes the stranger and the outcast, 
Works for the good of all,
Builds bridges, 
Seeks after the truth that will set us free.

But faith also 
Judges, kills, hates,
Sides with the oppressors, 
Is oppression,
Hoards power, 
Builds walls, 
And tells lies to itself and any one who will listen. 

The light side of the faith is about peace. 

The dark side of the faith is about anger, fear, aggression. 
Its is, as the green one says, 
Quicker,
Easier,
More seductive. 

Because the story of every sacred scripture,
The story of belief,
Whether religious or secular,
Is always the story of the light side the dark. 

The Bible is not a story of unbroken, 
Good faith, faith that is woven all of the light. 
It is the story of a faith that begins tribally
In darkness and violence and conquest
And making everyone else 
The Other. 
The Dark Side of the Faith. 

But then Faith begins to grow outward.
At every stage, in every story,
Faith is pushed outward into the light.
Faith is always battling against its own dark side
Leaning toward the light.
The prophets fought for the light. 
Jesus said he was the light. 

And it was the dark side of the faith,
Faith as an institution,
Faith as government,
That killed him.

The saga continues. 
It doesn't matter what you have faith in:
A philosophy,
The universe,
Scientific wisdom...
There is no faith that doesn't have 
A dark side and a light side. 

In that galaxy far, far away,
The light side and dark side battle each other 
In epic space battles and light saber duels.
But in our galaxy, 
the Dark Side and the Light Side 
May sit in the same pew
Or subway bench,
Or stand next to each other 
In neighboring voting booths.
Or politely shake hands.

Underneath all its used future hardware
The movies teach us something valid
About everyday life. 
We all believe in something,
And those beliefs can lead us into darkness
Or into light. 
And the battle between the two 
is really fought 
Inside each of us every day.