Religion. It’s a topic that everyone has probably contemplated their beliefs about at at least some point in their lives. There are countless religions and ideas about the afterlife and reincarnation. As society evolves, more people feel safe talking about their perspectives on life, and what they believe — or don’t believe.
DV AP World History teacher, Ms. Deme Sakkis, believes strongly in the power of having faith in something like god. She said that praying to god was something she realized she could do to motivate herself to become a better person, and it changed her life.
“I made some healthier life changes. And through those life changes, I discovered that I couldn’t really [continue to] make those healthier choices without the help of a higher power. Because I couldn’t be left to my own devices. I was going to do all the things I used to be doing and just making some unhealthy choices,” she said. Then, a friend suggested that she start praying.
“As I started praying, … I started to feel better and better and get stronger and make better choices. And that’s really when God came into my life,” Sakkis said.
She spoke about how believing in God gave her strength and motivation. Though growing up Christian, she had never really formed a personal relationship with god, and once she realized she could, she started to tell god things whenever she needed to calm herself.
“It gets me up in the morning. It makes my day good. Whenever I’m having a hard day, I just go in the bathroom and just say ‘God, help me’ and I feel better … for me, it’s more of a daily moment to moment practice of connecting with that thing that’s bigger than me, which I call God,” Sakkis said.
Furthermore, sophomore Raen Kramer said she really started to feel religious herself when she, too, began to develop a personal relationship with god during a difficult time.
“I went through a time in my life where I wasn’t depressed, but I was very sad. I felt like life was just like an endless cycle … and that period of time where I felt that way, was when I started to drift away from God,” she said.
She spoke about how during this time, she talked to her mother about how she felt, and realized that as she spent more time feeling this way, that was time she could’ve been praying, so she began speaking to god and praying again.
“I just realized that praying just helped that immediately — it gave me motivation for doing things in life. He is my source of power. He’s my source of feeling like I need to do something in my life … I think the main thing in my life that makes me have joy, and want to be motivated — all of that is God,” Kramer said. Talking to god when she needed help, and feeling what she believed was god’s presence through signs she believed were from god — things that some might believe to just be coincidences — gave her hope and courage to move through a challenging point in her life.
Contrastingly, sophomore Sahana Vivek’s considers herself as an atheist.
“Growing up, most of our beliefs are impacted by our parents because they’re the people who tell us what path to follow. So for most of my life, I did believe in Hinduism, but then when I had the maturity and independence to think about it and choose for myself, I started going more towards atheism,” she stated. Furthermore, she added that although she doesn’t believe in a specific religion, she believes that there is something before and after human life.
“I believe that when we die, our essence and our soul doesn’t completely go away — our bodies are disposed of, but I feel like there’s still a soul; I believe it goes somewhere, and doesn’t just disappear … I just have faith that when I die, I’ll still be alive somewhere,” Vivek said.
Similarly, a lot of people, such as Mr. Smith*, a teacher at Dougherty Valley High School, say that belief in a higher being isn’t just black and white. He grew up in a Catholic family who went to church every Sunday, but as he grew up and met new people with new ideas and beliefs, his understandings of an upper power and life beyond death changed. He felt that though while being Catholic is still part of who he is, he also resonated with beliefs from so many other religions, and he was amazed to see how accepting many of the religions were.
“I believe that [because of my beliefs] I can listen to someone talk about their religion, or who they are as a spiritual person without any bias or preconceived notions of how it should be. I don’t know how it should be, and I’m always fascinated and curious to hear how other people think it is. I always think it’s really cool if someone talks about something that personal to them,” he said. He believes that his liberal perspective on the topic allowed him to listen unbiasedly when others spoke to him about what they believed — it was fascinating to listen to others’ ideas of how they thought life worked.
“It gives me an insight into who they are, and it gives me an insight to how they think the world works. I think that’s really important. If we want to be good human beings, we need to listen to other people and how they think things are,” he said.
*anonymous source
