Question God
I’m sorry God if you constantly think I’m disrespectful or even disdainful. I get frustrated at religion and can’t understand exactly what is going on out there and why people struggle with maintaining a sense of self although they’re still happy to turn up to church on time every Sunday morning.
Why does my partner’s grandmother insist on questioning her grandson on how often he goes to church? Does it matter that he funds donations to third world countries or to conservation foundations? Apparently, any community goodwill is completely insignificant in light of the dismissal of formal religion. Just turn up on Sunday and you’ve fulfilled your religious obligations. When religion is held out there as the meaning to life, I walk away sadly unfulfilled yet possessed of an unobtainable sense of responsibility to encompass religious duties. I walk away from church determined to be a better person. Funnily enough, church failed to equip me with the tools required to be a better person. Does it all mean I can’t lose my temper at my ADHD son’s outbursts? Must I keep a gentle voice when I correct my auditory memory challenged stepdaughter? Should I maintain all sense of decorum when my 50 percent deaf son fails to acknowledge me from the next room as I call his name? Can I lovingly ignore the tines of the fork in my backside when I’m late on cooking dinner from a hungry two-year-old?
It is so frustrating to witness the archaic view of humanity. When did “church-goers” decide that they were the pinnacle of a perceived level of salvation? When did forgiveness and a lack of judgementalism fail to apply? It seems that religion has completely lost touch with modern day reality and has failed to evolve.
Religion believes that people are moving away from God. Is it not conceivable that God is moving away from religion? What if God was not happy with organised religion? When religion has become so much of a ritual and not a lifestyle, where is the appeal? I want acceptance rather than a feeling of being ostracised. My religious upbringing has taught me all the fundamentals of “religion” yet nothing of life.
I do have a concept of turning the other cheek and walking the extra mile that is biblical. That is love for fellow mankind. Fortunately, regardless of all my religious “training”, I met reality and possibly I entertained the concept of a real God. The God that entertains me, however periodically, was nothing like the awe-inspiring, fear-inducing monstrosity introduced to me in Sunday school.
My current "God" is simply an entity to which I can shout and blame and thank and cry on any given day. None of it had to make sense. I was just able to do it. Some days I felt like screaming abuse, so I did. Some days I felt like being grateful, so I was. Guess what? The days I hurled abuse I wasn’t taken down in a bolt of lightning and I didn’t have any riches bestowed upon me on the days I was eternally grateful.
I realised I was comfortable with my perception of God. I could be me. Just me. I didn’t have to be the best of me. Just insignificant, little me. Religion had always made me feel that I needed to better myself to be accepted, but I believe that not to be the case. I don’t feel guilty at shouting at "God". If I was made in that image (whatever that means) then surely my emotions are completely valid and I’m able to express them. I don’t want to hurl them at the nearest loved one so I hurl the abuse at the being I believe can handle it and possibly laugh at my tantrums.
What’s even more frustrating for me is that I know that I am being judgemental towards Christians particularly. I am assessing fellow man and making a decision on them every time I meet them. It’s not fair to them, yet that is obviously one of my many character flaws. I believe that is something that every human being is capable of doing. Our inherent nature as a human causes us to assess people given the available information from their personality from our perception.
I wish we could all accept people at their own level. Why do people become so obsessed with money or the bible or cleanliness that they cannot assist fellow man? We turn away from people less fortunate than ourselves, because we don’t know how to fix it or because we don’t know how to cope with it.
In Western society, we’ve filled our lives up with so much stuff we don’t have time to devote to getting to know each other fully. We can hide behind technology and fail to reveal who we really are or in fact get to know who we really are. People hide behind religion, disguising their true self.
Why does Christianity want to mould me into its perceptions of the perfect human? I’ve obviously “turned away from God” because I don’t attend church and therefore have abandoned organised religion. I don’t kneel beside the bed and make ritualistic prayer. Oh dear, I’m really on a downhill run now. In fact, when I speak to "God" and don’t address the whole matter as if it was a formal letter: Dear heavenly father, Dear Jesus, etc. does that imply I don’t respect God? No, it can’t because I know I do. It does mean that "God" has changed for me rather than me being forced to adopt the typical religious ethos. How ludicrous to think that God would change his nature for me! Who do I think I am that I can demand such a thing? I’m nobody but I’m also somebody. It’s not his own nature he’s changing at all in my opinion. He doesn’t have to stay in the same form for everyone. He can change to whatever form he wants to have a relationship with someone. That’s my comfort level with my “God” whomever that may be.
I’m going to question exactly who "God" is and I believe that’s fine. I am passionate about certain things in my life and I believe they’re the way for me to best see "God" in day-to-day life. So, I’m sorry God but I refuse to accept your existence and personality based on a Sunday school lesson as a child and therefore I’m off to explore...