Why, What, and Belief

Years ago i went through the Coming of Age process at my church. It's a Unitarian equivalent of a Bar/Bat Mitzvah or First Communion. It's a marker that defines the transition from youth to adult in the UU church. One of the pieces of this process is the writing of a credo. This is often not given the due diligence it deserves.

I held then, and still hold now, the belief that your credo should be both a living document and as complete as possible. This belief upset some of my fellow youth who felt that I was unduly questioning their beliefs. Eventually I stopped asking yet the reason I was asking was important and I still feel is important.

Most religions have a creed, their practitioners are told not only what to believe but more importantly why they believe it. It is the why that most UU's don't get. We know what we believe, in fact if you ask almost anyone I'm certain they can tell you what they believe yet the ability to articulate why they hold their beliefs is much rarer.

If Unitarian Universalism is ever going to be anything other then a niche religion it's practitioners need to be able to not only say what they believe in but why they believe, and what is more the why needs to be air tight.

Now this is no small task and I know this, a creed is a living document, it is expected to grow and change as the person who wrote it grows and changes. I'm sure my creed if I were to write it today would differ greatly from the one I wrote all those years ago in Coming of Age. Yet I had inadvertently begun a quest to add the why to the what and it's only now that I've begun to formalize that and begun to realize the importance of why as well as what.

How to write a creed:
1) Determine what you believe.
2) Talk to someone who disagrees with your beliefs. Defend yours and challenge theirs. Do this as often as necessary till your certain in what you believe.
3) Determine why you believe what you believe.
4) Talk to someone who disagrees with your beliefs. Defend yours and challenge theirs. Do this as often as necessary till your certain your reasoning is both valid and sound.

Let's see if it actually works.