My current relationship with faith and Jesus

I love to talk about Jesus. 

This is confusing to some people, as I am fairly vocal about being an agnostic Humanist.

So I thought maybe it would be helpful and/or interesting for me to try to clarify what my current relationship is to faith and Jesus.

Before I talk about the present, I should probably establish where I came from. I live in the Bible belt. I grew up going to church 3 times a week, and attending school with daily Bible classes and weekly chapel sessions. Then I was actively involved in church until I was in my late 30s. I am probably above average in my knowledge of the Bible. I might even be well above average. This is part of who I am, and I have no reason to deny it.

Despite a painful departure from the last church family that I actively worshiped with, bad experiences were not my impetus for leaving the faith. My reason was quite literally reason. If you want to you can read more about that here: https://jasonfaylen.blogspot.com/2017/05/i-am-no-longer-religious.html.

So where am I now? 

This will be a series of points that describe a perspective that is likely unique to me.

I want to be very clear about something important: I am not "angry at God", which would require believing in him/it. On the contrary, I do not believe that a deity exists that fits the description I was taught about for most of my life.

Furthermore, I do not believe in anything "supernatural." I believe that there is nothing beyond the natural universe, but I'll qualify that by adding that I think that "natural" encompasses some things that spiritual people would probably categorize as supernatural.

I also want to say that, unlike some very vocal atheists, I have little desire to eradicate religion. I have many religious friends and loved ones, and we are in agreement on many things. I can probably find deeply held convictions in common with people from all faiths.

I believe that religion is frequently used to make the world a better place:
- I love it when religion is used to build up people and communities;
- I love it when religion is used to pursue justice;

I like to think that the occasions where I disapprove of religion are those situations in which it is actually being misused:
- I hate it when religion is used as a weapon to hurt or subjugate others;
- I hate it when religion is used to make ones self feel superior to others;
- I hate it when religion is used to subvert reason, especially as it pertains to medicine and science.

As a Humanist, I believe that human life is the highest priority we should honor in determining "right and wrong." There are a lot of catchy ways to summarize my value system, but I've found that my favorite one is already familiar to most people: "Love your neighbor as you love yourself." Even if I wanted to I could not disconnect myself from the Christian imagery and language that has permeated so much of my life. Fortunately, I don't want to, and considering that I still live in the Bible belt, and I am still surrounded by people who similarly understand this ideology, it makes sense that I continue to use this vocabulary that we're all familiar with.

So I love to talk about Jesus. I talk about Jesus more than many "Christians" I know. Some might even call me a Jesus Freak. I'm OK with that.