How do you reconcile that with your discomfort about much of your connection to religion being circumstantial? Isn’t that very different than what you just told me?

So, just now, I was explaining what she meant. How it relates to my answer above being uncomfortable is that I can't grow in my faith unless I'm honest with myself about the shortcomings of my faith, including any shaky foundations.

After all, the post you just gave me is the practiced rhetoric of a firm believer. You were able to fall back into it quite easily, but does it accurately reflect how you really feel?

Cutting right to the quick of it, aren't you? As mentioned elsewhere in this thread, I am a cradle Episcopalian and it shouldn't be surprising that I have the official ready to drop, but what I wrote above is, yes, something I fully believe even after poking at it with my skeptical mind.

Do you still feel this tie to Christ and that you are being held to this divine mandate given that you were saying you (your faith?) was at a low point a couple posts earlier?

I don't always feel as tied to Christ as I would prefer, or maybe better to say as much as Zi think I should be. But yes, I still feel the impetus to follow the example of Christ even in these low times, because I genuinely think a path of radical love, forgiveness, charity, and empathy is ideal. On that, I can hope at least I've been consistent.