Believing In Goldy’s Corner

The definition of “belief” is “to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so.” So much of believing sometimes is good old faith. And what is faith? Where does it come from? Within? What our parents have taught us? What we’ve seen through the lenses of our own experiences?  Someone’s belief can be as individualized as their own DNA.

I’ll never understand why people spend so much time trying to prove something isn’t real. So much of the world’s problem right now stems from this. If we could start looking for the things we can believe in, focus on what we think of as “good,” we would have such a different world.

I have a lot of friends that are Agnostic or Atheist. Since I was a child we have all lived in harmony with no problems, arguments, or disagreements. I knew where they stood and they respected my beliefs and we walked in peace. Many used to be Catholic like me, or grew up in a Christian household and formed their own beliefs over time. Some just still have questions. And that’s ok. We are all on our own personal journeys. 

As a Catholic, I would go to Midnight mass, where I’d always nod off to sleep mid-homily. It wasn’t that I wasn’t interested, but opening all those Christmas Eve presents at my Aunt’s house wiped me out! I’d sleep on the cold Minnesota winter night’s ride home and my mom would sleepily walk me up the stairs and tuck me into my warm bed.  But I’d soon wake up and watch out the bedroom window for hours waiting to see Santa and his reindeer come to our house. Every year I missed him, but not for a lack of trying. I’d wake up Christmas morning with Christmas tree branch imprints on my face.

So many times on social media I see people trying to disprove or discredit someone beautiful.  They strongly disagree he exists and try to take him out of our schools and remove him from our everyday lives. But no matter how much they try, I find the irony in the fact they don’t realize there’s a little bit of Jesus or Santa Claus and all of us. Sometimes I see Jesus Christ in my atheist friends the most.

I see Santa in the people who roll down their window at traffic intersections and hold out their hand with a few dollars for a human being in need.  St. Nicholas can be seen on many nights as couples hold hands walking down the street offering a bag of leftovers to someone who needs it more than they do.  Maybe they aren’t wearing a Santa suit but that always looks like Father Christmas to me.

Disproving I find to be a waste of energy. And when you spend time on the negative forces in life, you kind of look dumb. Is it the popular consensus that Jesus isn’t real? The entire world shuts down for the pandemic. Mom and pop shops, local businesses are closed and condemned in the riots of 2020, but one store stands tall and is allowed to be OPEN. WAL-MART! But not on one special day. Every year I take this photo. Every year most of the world recognizes this birthday. Even the cockroach of big box stores is quiet. Walmart closes. This MUST be an epic day!

I learned a valuable lesson as a child watching the musical “The Music Man.” People have this thirst, this hunger to WANT to believe. I don’t know when it gets taken away. Kids believe instinctively. The music instructor in the movie basically influences parents to buy their children instruments and brainwashes them into thinking their kids are STARS. They all stink but the folks WANT to believe they are the parents of true talent. The ending of the movie has a hellacious performance that could cause permanent brain damage. Horrible. But to the townspeople, it was “music” to their ears. We “believe” what we want to.

Our faith is formed early on. There are so many different divisions, sections, and sanctions. My point of this article is to remind you to see all sides. Hold your own, but respect and LEARN from others. It won’t hurt you. It will bring you closer to humanity and maybe even your own faith.

Come Christmas time black Santa’s were running rampant throughout North Minneapolis. Every mantle Christmas tree, ornament, Christmas card, and Santa in the yard was a brother. I lived in what was called then and still is referred to as “the hood.” And I loved it. I fit in just fine.

I remember in grade school getting in arguments with the other kids who screamed at me “Santa is white!” I disagreed because I had always known him to be black.  I let them argue. I let them disbelieve because I figured no matter what color saint Nicholas was I was going to get more stuff regardless because I “believed” in him for whoever he was. It wasn’t the color people should have been worried about but the spirit of the holiday and what it meant. 

As I grew up I met many people who disagreed with me on more than Santa’s skin tone.  Something to be learned from my atheist friends is they may not believe what I do, but they still “believe.” Why look at someone with a difference of opinion as an adversary? 

Bin Hamin, Pro wrestler, conspiracy theorist, podcaster, Patreon creator, and owner of Hamin Media Group guested on my Podcast Goldy’s Closet. See promo here: https://bit.ly/3o5v3dx Stream here: (https://spoti.fi/3pAk6kH)

I remember him dropping a bomb on our guests and me, saying similar things my father spoke of, a fiscally conservative Christian, who always made reference to The Nephilim mentioned in Genesis 6:1-4, (https://biblia.com/bible/esv/genesis/6/1-4)

These Giants” spoken about In Numbers 13:33, are described as fierce, as large in size compared to the Israelites, who look like grasshoppers in comparison.

Bin Hamin’s bomb refers to the Jesus origin story in his own way. “If you look at the story and the demigods having sex with the daughters of man and that’s when they produced these Giants or what have you, who’s to say three wise men see a light in the sky and they follow it.  That’s a MUFON level record of an event. Maybe they were doing some type of impregnation if this if Jesus is born with powers.  I’m not saying that it is or isn’t. It’s just is if you start lining things up and take out God and put in UFO and aliens in some of these things it lines up in some interesting ways.”

This story made some of my Christian friends very angry. They felt it blasphemous. Other friends listening who were Atheists, Agnostics, or undecided, suddenly saw a different twist that they connected to. One saying, “maybe Jesus was an alien?” 

So I ask you if he was, does that take away everything he did and the truths he taught? Does how he made it to this earth determine whether or not he is the messiah or Son of God? To me, Bin’s possible perspective just makes me think more and appreciate the savior I believe in, knowing I DON’T have all the answers, but still “BELIEVE”.

Lately, I’ve had more people challenging my faith and asking me why I believe what I believe. Surprisingly enough I was not able to always answer them. It appears that until my beliefs were questioned, I didn’t even think about “why” I believe what I do.

Someone said to me the other day, “why do we eat eggs and bacon for breakfast? Who decided that?” After all, that is what many Americans believe is a standard breakfast, isn’t it? Where does that even come from? Of all the things in the world that could be continental, it ended up being eggs and bacon.

Something as simple of a concept as that got me really evaluating everything I find to be “true”. If the VERY definition of “Belief” is: “to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so.” If that definition is TRUE, then how do you know your belief is the CORRECT one? It’s YOUR truth.

The golden take-home here, and please hear me, is you don’t have to agree with everyone or believe what they believe but at least respect them enough to listen to what they’re saying. You might find some nugget that gets you thinking or actually understanding WHY you believe what you do.

– Goldy Knows

Bin Hamin Twitter @Bin_Hamin & @HaminMediaGroup

https://www.patreon.com/HaminMediaGroup