God or Mother Nature: Who are you rooting for?

 Photo by DESIGNECOLOGIST on Unsplash

I’m sick of God.

The Christian God appears to me to be nothing more than a figurehead, designed by man to answer questions he can’t answer and to justify his inherent need to control others.

I’m calling BS on the whole thing.

I’m not saying there is no higher power, but if the God depicted in the Old Testament really exists, he’s kind of a dick.

For one thing, he’s a troublemaker. Why would God motivate his followers to pick fights over who others choose to worship? Why would he feel the need to encourage people to kill in his name? This is not the behavior of a God who is all knowing, all seeing, merciful, loving, etc.

This is how ego-maniacal men behave. Does God have an ego?

Why else demand that he be worshiped? Is it not enough that he can already see everything we do, and knows every thought we have?

And what about this business of performing sacrifices in his name? If he’s knowing and all powerful, why does he needs us to kill someone to show him we believe him?

I’ll tell you what I’d say if I were Abraham and God told me to murder my only son, I’d say, “You do it.” Then I’d run like hell taking my son with me even if it meant I’d go down with him.

In the end God gives Abraham a ram to kill instead, but why did he have to kill anything? And why make his suffering even greater by asking Abraham’s son to carry the wood he was expecting to use to build the fire that would take his life? That’s just mean.

Christians have concluded that the whole Abraham thing was actually a set up for Jesus to save us. The story of Abraham must have predated Jesus by at least 1,000 years.

1,000+ years is a long set-up. What were the people who lived between Abraham and Jesus supposed to believe? Are they not saved?

∞

Don’t even get me started on the Book of Job. The entire story is nothing but a pissing contest between God and Satan. God torments a man to prove to Satan that Job’s loyalty to God is unconditional and will not wane even if his good fortune is diminished.

God tortured a man to prove a point—and not even a good point—only that God’s ability to brainwash his followers is stronger than Satan’s ability to brainwash his followers.

Throughout the Old Testament, God practices distinctly human behavior, and not even admirable human behavior. It’s as if God’s entire agenda is to pave the way for men to follow suit by killing to prove their points and torturing to show their power.

Which is what men do, after all.

They glorify war by telling themselves it’s an honor to kill for God and their country. I disagree. The honor would be in communicating to solve problems, resolve conflicts, share ideas, and find ways to live and let live. Religion can’t help with that.

Religion creates divisiveness, it doesn’t resolve it.

Look at the Crusades—holy wars that went on for centuries, killing millions, all in the name of Jesus Christ.

Wasn’t Jesus the one who said, “Turn the other cheek”? The hypocrisy is overwhelming.

Oh well, not to worry. If you happen to believe in salvation by grace alone, you’re guaranteed entry to heaven no matter how bad you’ve been, as long as you believe.

Convenient, isn’t it?

∞

Spider Robinson wrote “God is an Iron.”

“If a person who indulges in gluttony is a glutton, and a person who commits a felony is a felon, then God is an iron. Or else he’s the dumbest designer that ever lived.”

Either way, it seems obvious to me that religion has it backwards.

God did not create man in his image—man created God in his--hence the comically hypocritical design.

The irony of asking Catholic priests to refuse marriage as a sacrifice to God, then sanctioning conspiracies to help them cover up their sexual abuse of children is the biggest irony of all.

Spider was right. God is an Iron.

∞

Mother Nature is the higher power in my book. She doesn’t let her ego get in the way. She doesn’t even have one—she’s pure justice. You poison the planet, the planet poisons you. Cause and effect—it doesn’t get more real than that.

She isn’t jerking us around to show how great she is, she’s giving us information so we can adjust, accordingly. When we deplete the soil of all its nutrients by growing the same crops over and over without any attention to the long-term consequences, she doesn’t rescue us. She forces us to do the right thing and diversify so we can bring back the balance of nature.

She’s a mother for crying out loud. She’s trying to teach us. She doesn’t ask to be worshipped. She asks us to take responsibility for our mistakes.

God doesn’t teach--he bullies--providing men with a perfect excuse for doing the same.

Besides, nobody should worship another being. It’s a recipe for disaster. Whether it’s Jesus Christ, Jim Jones, Donald Trump or the Golden Calf, worship is not about sacrifice or humility, it’s about being on the right side.

Worship correctly, and you’re in the club. Worship the wrong party, and you’re a target for everything from abandonment and humiliation to torture and/or death.

And who’s going to tell us which God is the true God?

Some guy?

I think not.

∞

Mother Nature is not an iron. She is a mirror.

She mirrors who we are and what we do. She makes no excuses for us—she allows us to see ourselves clearly so we can understand what works and what doesn’t.

She gives us a chance at becoming our best selves rather than excusing the worst in us.

Mother Nature is Life. She is honest. I’m rooting for her.