Hi Celine. I can understand why you would question your faith at a time that you most need it. I hope you don't mind me weighing in on that. I read many sci-fi, horror, and fantasy novels as a young person. I would occasionally read about various philosophies, including existentialism. I ran across a poem in a Dean Koontz novel that really spoke to me.
“The sky at night is deep and dark,
The light from the stars is so damn stark,
When I look up, I fill with fear,
If all we have, is what lies here.
This lonely world, this troubled place,
Then cold dead stars and empty space.
Well I see no reason to persevere,
No reason to laugh or shed a tear.
No reason to sleep, or ever to wake,
No promises to keep, and none to make.
And so at night I still raise my eyes,
To study the clear, but mysterious skies,
That arch above us, as cold as stone.
Are you there God?
Are we alone?”
I found the poem captivating. I contemplated it many times over many years. This poem seems to imply that, if there is nothing beyond the scope of our short lives… then nothing really matters. That if there is no God and no souls or spirits, then there is no meaningful consequence to living.
Suppose that we were just soulless chemical computers assembled by random fluctuations of the space-time continuum. There would be no free will. We would simply be a consequence of the light and matter bumping together in the various ways that they do, which would utterly dictate our actions in every moment, and our idea of being alive would simply be the way that we had been dictated to by the events around us and the nature of the elements we were composed of.
Then when we would die, it would be like turning off a computer. When everyone that we know would die, it would be as if we had never existed. Like nothing ever mattered. Everything that ever happened would be utterly neutral, because nothing ever truly lived.
The way that I came to see that idea, is that people who would believe in such a state, would be people who only believe in what they can see, touch, taste, smell, hear, or otherwise measure. People don’t always perceive things the same way though, or think the same things. They each have placed their beliefs in the things that seem true to them.
But did it ever really seem that there was no reason to persevere? No reason to laugh, or shed a tear? No reason to sleep, or ever to wake? No promises to keep, and none to make?
It kinda seems like things matter. They do. Ever loved somebody? Tell me it didn't matter. Ever been loved? Tell me it doesn't matter. What if you had never been loved? Would that not matter? Do broken promises matter? Horrific things happen to people, children, and helpless animals. Does that not matter? Would you tell me that those things do not matter? I see meaning wherever someone is kind. I see meaning everywhere. I think it matters. I find it impossible to believe that nothing matters. Your life matters and so does your daughter's.
I hope you can find your way to a happy life, despite the challenges you will face. I hope a miracle comes your way, but in the meantime, I believe you'll be an amazing miracle to your daughter.