Hello Everyone,
As some of you know, I have a very odd relationship with God. Not that you could call it a relationship, more a passing acquaintance.
It's not so much that I don't believe in God.
I have no desire to offend any of you so be warned, as I am about to give my own opinions on God and the Bible and they are a little out there to be honest.
Ok here goes, God I do think exists, but it's more that I believe in a higher power than a God in the way that others believe, but I'm not so sure that he is a he or for that matter that he is always on the ball.
You see if I was God there are things that I would put a stop to once and for all.
Firstly there is the suffering of children, especially in poor countries. It appalls me that so many children are born to die and suffer so much in their short little lives. In my travels around the World I have seen children gravely ill, others picking over rubbish on a dump just to try to find something to eat or sell in order to buy food.
I went to Romania and we could smell the orphanage from about 3miles away, so bad was the stench and when we got there we had to wade through sewage that was ankle deep. I saw children there that were tied to their cots and banging their head off the bars of their cots. With sunken hollow eyes and paper thin skin stretched over bones. There was one thing I didn't see in the 10 weeks that I spent there and that was God.
Over here for the last 15 yrs I have done voluntary work with a charity that helps mothers and children come to terms with sexual abuse, again I don't see God in all this.
I didn't see God the day my Father tried to throw my Mum off a balcony in front of us all, while my brother Terry clung on to my mothers legs and all I could hear was screaming, which was coming from me, a 3yr old me.
I didn't see God when as a 17yr old I was brutally rape and held hostage by 3 men for 5days.
I didn't see God when my husband beat me in front of the kids time and time again.
I didn't see God when my Mum died so suddenly that there was no time for goodbye and it still hurts 14yrs on, it has left the deepest scar of all.
I didn't see God when I lost and buried 3 children.
I certainly didn't see God the night that my brother I was closet too was murdered.
If he/she was there all those times, they weren't showing themselves to me.
Someone once said to me that if you don't get an answer to your pray, it's Gods way of telling your ass NO!!!! I've been hearing No my whole life.
As for the Bible, I find it to be a nice collection of stories, like Harry Potter or, The Chronicles of Narnia or Aesop's Fables, each and every one of them being a moral guide to how we should treat each other and all full of common sense guide lines.
So when I am at a girlfriends house for supper and another guest insists on saying grace, I will excuse myself from the table until it is over and done with.
Now don't get me wrong, I do have friends who are very religious and I won't be so rude as to refuse to take part in the saying of grace, but if it's not YOUR home and YOUR supper what the devil gives you the right to demand grace is said.
As for getting all uppity because I refuse to stay put, well don't get me started on that one. I'm 47 and can think for myself.
People are entitled to their beliefs and if God, The Holy Bible and saying Grace is your bag then that's fine by me.
If you want to believe the moon is made of blue cheese, who am I to argue with you. You are perfectly at liberty to believe what ever you want to and I would be the first to fight for your right to have your belief system.
But why must some people get so up themselves if I don't have the same way of looking at things.
I have been told that I will never be invited to this persons home, bothered!!!!!!
I've never been up Everest and I can't say that I'm bothered by that either.
I think it's great if people have a belief system that carries them through the hard times in life. How wonderful for them to be able to have something to turn to that gives them comfort and guidance in times of trouble. I do believe that religion has it's place for some people, just not me.
Because I believe in that I sent my kids to a Catholic school and made sure they knew about their Jewish roots, as well as teaching them about other religions and faiths, but I left it to them to make their own minds up about God. It's a personal relationship and people should come to that decision from an informed point of view.
Am I doomed to Hell, well I'll just have to wait and see and if God wants to know what exactly I was up to during my time on the planet, I shall happily inform him/her that I was doing my up-most-best with the circumsatnces, trials and tribulations that were thrown my way.
That I lived my life to the best of my abilities, that I choose to live a moral life and treat people with respect and decency, that I didn't break the laws of the land and that I let people have whatever belief system gave them comfort with out question. And that I would defend their right to do so.
Is it really too much to expect the same?
I'm extremely upset to hear of all the things you've endured. You've had entirely too much horror in your life and yet you're a wonderful person still.
ReplyDeleteI admire you for your courage to keep going in spite of it all.
Know that I believe in you.
I've always said that it's not the religion that counts as it is having the faith and making a difference in humanity. I can't see God, in his wisdom, saying one can't enter heaven due to they were the wrong faith when that person did so much to help their fellow human beings. It sounds like you have done your fair share of work, I think you'll be ok.
ReplyDeleteWhatever religion, political party or whatever you belong to, there are people who won't invite you into their home because of it.
ReplyDeleteIt's part of the territory, is all. Means nothing.
To amplify, I think that the practice of most religions as carried out by most adherents, has nothing much to do with God.
ReplyDeleteI have great problems with the idea than an all-powerful God cares if you say grace or not. Or cares about what you wear. Or thinks that displaying your body is obscene. Or wants you to kill in His name (He could do that himself if He felt like it, no?) And so on.
Sorry, just doesn't make sense to me.
Bloody hell, lia! (And that's from one who never swears out loud - or in print!)
ReplyDeleteWith that history it's a wonder you're still sane let alone being polite about God.
I have absolutely no idea why so many bad things happen to innocent people. Well, I suppose theologically I do: it's because evil is in the world, man has free will and the weak are abused by the powerful. But knowing that in my head doesn't stop me shouting at God, 'WHY?!!!'
The only thing I can say is that God does make an appearance in the mess. A young female friend spent three years working at an orphanage in Albania, in much the same circumstances you describe in Romania. That was God at work.
And you will have helped loads of women in the last 15 years by listening, empathising and being there for them. I won't say that was God - I don't want to offend you - but it was good that came out of your past.
As for grace before food or any of the petty rules that are used by some people to define Christianity, I think God must look at them and wonder where the connection is with the life that Jesus led and died.
God's grace, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter and beyond value.
Lots of love to you, Lia. xx
I love what Marianne Williamson has to say about God..., for example..., that God is not the creator of pain and suffering, people are..., and that people project onto God their own beliefs, making "Him" a person. At the end, we all have to figure it out for ourselves, right!
ReplyDeleteI truly wish you all the best for 2010!!!
Wow.
ReplyDeleteBOY howdy do I understand this one all too well.
Once upon a time I was acutely aware of where I thought 'G-d wasn't'.
Experience has shown me different. But boy, was it a process and a half.
And frankly, my relationship with my G-d is an awesome thing--not once has He demanded I be what other's want me to be--just all that I was created TO be. Sounds like you're doing an upstanding job of that yourself!
:-)