Faith and Schroedinger’s Waiting Room
It’s 6:30 am at a hospital in New Orleans. We’ve been here since 5:30 and I have been up since 2 in the morning.
My Brother, his wife and my mother sit alongside my nephew. He will be six months old in exactly 1 week. That is, if he gets through the day. He has DOWNS syndrome, you see. In and of itself, that isn’t the worst thing in the world. But did you know that most DOWNS babies have heart defects? Ones that need to be corrected with surgery during their infancy? I didn’t. I never really thought about it. But then, no one ever wants to think about all the things that can happen to a baby.
My brother and his wife just took him– his name is Remy– to the room where they will wait for his surgery. The clock will tick back and forth for an hour. And then they will come back into the family waiting room. And then for 6 hours the clock will tick back and forth. Tick. The anesthesiologist enters the room. Tock. The pediatric heart surgeon scrubs in. Tick. Someone mentions the Johnny Depp trial to take their mind off of things. Tock. The doctor walks out to talk to us. 6 hours.
It's 6:45 am now. I’ve been up for almost 5 hours.
I can’t help but think of Schroedinger’s Cat. Because from the second my brother and sister-in-law return, we’ll all be Schroedinger. Remy will- in some sense literally- be both alive and dead until the second the doctor makes his entrance.
Yesterday I was listening to a debate between Professor Jordan Peterson and Sam Harris on whether religion is necessary in a modern society. Peterson, a prodigious intellect, often talks about the power of religion. He even wrote a book called Maps of Meaning. Harris is also an incredibly intelligent man and one of the most famous anti-theists. He’s also more than a little arrogant, as most anti-theists tend to be.
Harris’ point- as I understand it- is that a modern society shouldn’t need to dope up its populace on stories of magical saviors and a glorious afterlife. He doesn’t understand the need for it.
I myself don’t have a religion. I was raised Catholic, but it just didn’t take. I am, in most people’s estimation, difficult. That extends to my philosophical exercises as well. Despite my mother’s protests and fears, I cannot accept Jesus Christ as anything other than an important historical figure.
But as I sit here in the spaces between tick and tock, with my nephew philosophically both alive and dead for the next several hours, I put aside my lack of religion. I silently pray. Not to Jesus or Yahweh or Allah or Vishnu. I pray to whatever powers are out there that make up the grandeur of existence. Just give us this. Take me if you need to, but give this child a chance to live.
I don’t know if those powers can hear me. I don’t know if they perceive me anymore than I notice the prayers of an ant. But I do it anyway.
While I don’t prescribe to any religion, I can’t help but believe there is something more out there. You see, I am a theist, not an atheist. And whether prayer works or not isn’t the point. In a larger perspective, whether God exists isn’t the point.
I’m sitting in a hospital; a temple of science. But more people pray in hospitals than in churches. Because as Remy sits in the space in between, I need to believe that someone is listening. And if the worst should happen, I need to believe that he will be going to a better place.
That doesn’t make me weak or stupid, or even intellectually dishonest.
It just means that I am human.
Dear God whose name I do not know. Thank you for my life.
-Joe vs the Volcano
May God stand between you and harm in all the empty places you may walk.
-J. Michael Stracyznski, Babylon 5
