Will The Real God Please Stand Up

Welcome back to my Dime Store; I see my competitive pricing has you rushing back in for more–and cheaper–helpings of layman’s wisdom and useless babbling. Our special today, is a personal one–religion. The idea for this blog came to me as I was watching an old home video of myself, as a child, receiving Communion. I’m going to take you through my thought processes with this one because I often make no sense if I don’t tell people how I made the mental leap from one topic to another.

I saw the video of myself and thought, “Wow, I was so small back then.” Then I thought, “Wow, my hair was ridiculous back then.” Then, I thought, “They must be using that old BetaMax camera to film this–damn.” And then I thought, “Religion is a very strange and complicated thing, I should write a blog about it.” I’m not kidding. Yeah, I’m aware that my train of thought actually makes less sense to you now than if I had just let you assume I’d progressed slowly from thoughts about Communion to a deeper philosophical question about religion. Well, tough. I’m not normal and I jumped in with both feet, without preamble.

For those of you who might be wondering, I do, indeed, believe that there is a God, a deity, a being of higher intelligence and/or power than ourselves that, if not orchestrated the entire creation of us, at least gave it a nudge in this direction. What I have the hard time understanding is religion, and I have an even harder time understanding the people who are zealots about their religion. My problem with religion is that I can’t get past the reality that all religions were, if not created by, then passed down by man. No one is born knowing all there is to know about God or the afterlife or anything like that. We, as children or quizzical adults, may infer as to the nature of things, and in doing so find an answer that is to our own liking about life and death and our origins in this world, but that doesn’t mean it’s true–it doesn’t mean that its wrong either, but that’s beside the point.

What I’m saying is that we have to be told about God and explained to, the details of a particular religious order–be it Christianity, Muslim, Judism, etc. Some people fall right in line with what they are taught, while others rebel against it as soon as they’re old enough. But in either case, do these choices require actual faith? Dochildren follow their parent’s religion because they believe it’s right or because they don’t know anything else? Do they break away because they believe it’s wrong or because they just want to be their own person, raging against what they’ve been taught to believe?

Then there are those that believe and believe and believe. They believe so wholeheartedly, in fact, that they don’t listen to anyone or anything else. They see their one view and they do not deviate from that road–ever! And if you try to say otherwise, then you’re the one whose stepping over the line, or possessed by the devil, or ignorant, etc. These are the people that will argue point by point with other religious people on concepts and theories that can never be truly proven. Is there such a thing as the Trinity? Body and Blood? Prophet or not? Virgin birth? Holy Spirit? Resurrection? Messiah or Man? Pope or no Pope? Hell or nothing?

It’s funny that they all agree that there is an omnipotent, unseen being, living somewhere beyond our plain of existence that created us in some way or another–which to me seems like it should be the hardest part to swallow–and yet they bicker like little children and start wars over details like whether that incredibly powerful, all knowing and all doing entity is part of a Holy Trinity (Father, Son, Holy Ghost) or not. I mean, so what if he is? So what if he isn’t? Does that really change your belief in God as a whole so much.

And each religion has to make it a point to say that other religions are dead wrong. I saw a Jehovah’s Witness laugh at a Moron preacher for trying to preach about their faith and about their prophet. Now come on, would it really be so impossible to believe that God sent someone else down to hand out new laws or rules about religion? Think about this, how silly did it sound to the Jews to have a carpenter’s son as the Messiah. And Jesus changed a lot of the laws and view of God at that time. Whose to say that if another Prophet, or Messiah came now, they would be accepted or believed. Would his/her news and laws seem like a bad joke or would it make sense?

I personally wonder whether God feels flattered by the attention or whether he’s disgusted by the fact that some people of different religions refuse to get along–and in some older cases, killed each other–to prove which is the best way to worship him.

Tangent: I hate it when people ask, “Are you here, today?” at work, while they are staring right at you. I always want to answer back, “Nope. You’re dreaming right now. Damn you’re life must be pathetic to be dreaming about work and me in particular. But I am most certainly not here, because if I were, you would be smart enough to know that I was here by simply looking at my corporeal form, and you would not be so stupid as to ask said corporeal being if it was actually corporeal. Do you go around asking me if I’m not there when you don’t see me, or does that only happen when you’re not dreaming about work?”

My personal opinion about religion is that they are all made or tainted by man. But if God were to have a hand in one, then doesn’t it stand to reason he would have had a hand in them all? At first glance, that may sound stupid or blasphemous, but think about it for a moment. Any omnipotent being would know that peoples separated by continents and culture would not respond the same way to the same message. More likely, they would require a different, more personalized message to get them to see the light. So maybe the deity of earth chose to give everyone a customized religious message, one that will appeal to their people, at their time, for their culture. Why? This way, each peoples gets a chance to be exposed to the message, as opposed to just one group of people in a select and remote region of the world. And remember that Judisim, and even Christianity, at first, was not meant to be spread to the wold at large. You were either chosen or you were not chosen. Does that make any sense to you? So if you weren’t chosen, and you lived in a region of the world that had little or no contact with said chosen people, how would you ever know of this hip, new alternative monotheistic religion. Talk about playing favorites.

Now, I was raised Catholic, so of course, I’m not one now. However, when I do go to church I still get a kick out of the ceremonies. I prefer a little pomp with my Savior. That’s not to say that I think incense and statues and chanting will make God any more godly nor Jesus any more jesusly than before, but I think if it attracts people into the seats to see vestiges and stain glass windows, then so be it–so long as they hear the right message. Some people prefer a stricter, more Spartan route to salvation, and that’s great too. We are all different people with different needs and comforts and fears, why not reflect that in our options of worship.

My point is, we have options, and I think we should all explore those options, even in religion. On top of that, we really should try to be able to have an open, discussion about our faith. People need to spend less time nitpicking about the specifics about their religion. Is it really a test that you have to get a hundred on to pass. Will a wrong answer here or there really hurt that much. Or will God say, “ you’ve lived a great life, been a great worshiper and have done no harm in any way...however, you believe in the Trinity. You think I share a body with two other dude? BAM!! You’re gonna have your face burned off in the eternal flames of hell.”

“Oh, wait, there is no hell; wait, its purgatory–wait, it’s reincarnation–wait, its oblivion–wait it’s a prison in Blargone 6"

Well, that’s my opinion. Thank you all for visiting the Dime Store; we’re closed in observation of the Sabbath.