"I call that mind free which masters the senses, and which recognizes its own reality and greatness: Which passes life, not in asking what it shall eat or drink, but in hungering, thirsting, and seeking after righteousness."

William Ellery Channing

Examining my life is something like examining an individual snowflake. The true beauty of a snowflake lies not in the examination, but in the tumble and fall, in its interactions with the billions of other snowflakes, in examining it against the quiet blanketing of a New England forest, or the crowning of a mountain in Utah. This is one of many stories I've told to explain my life.

As humans, we are driven by the need to explain. Life has few easy answers. Bad people go unpunished, and the virtuous unrewarded. Entire countries languish in poverty for generations. A dictator will oppress his people and there is no hero to challenge him with righteous anger. Children die from horrible, arbitrary illnesses. We love fiction partly for its ability to bring closure where the real world offers none. Religion offers the same hope.

We tell ourselves stories about how the universe works and these bring us hope. Because they are stories does not mean they are only stories. The most powerful lesson of love and tolerance that religion has to tell is often relayed as fiction. Consider the parable of the Good Samaritan. Yet isn't this story one of the truest ever told?

The danger comes when the story becomes more important than the life it is meant to explain. Stories of the afterlife, for example, can consume the living. What can we do to get to heaven? Are we doing enough? How can we help others reach heaven? Isn't it terrible that this child or friend has fallen off the true path and will be suffering instead of rejoicing in the next life? Let's meet weekly or daily to plan the ways we can improve our chances of pleasing God and getting to heaven. Isn't it terrible that so much of the world is wandering crooked paths, instead of the straight one that we have found?

These stories of certainty have one thing in common. They are mutually exclusive. If the Baptists are right, then the Mormons must be going to hell. If there is but no God but God and His name is Allah, and Mohammed is His prophet, then the Hindus must be idol worshipers who will suffer the eternal torment.

In the end, an obsession with the eternities will cripple the present. After all, we only know we have one life. It would be a shame to waste it speculating about the next. And if there is a God and he is just and merciful, would he really punish us for getting the answers wrong when we can't even agree on the questions?