In no particular order, I felt guilty for not being married, for not having children, for being bi, for being loud about issues such as racism, for not being a Christian, for letting myself get out of shape, for thoroughly enjoying sex in so many different ways and with so many different people, for not making more of myself, for wasting my life, for not having to worry as much about money as do other people, for not being able to single-handedly save the world, for being alternately aloof and clingy, for being so damn narcisstic, for craving fame, for not working hard enough to get said fame, for being a repudiation of everything my mom is, for accidentally kicking Raven twice today, for not being a better aunt/sister/daughter/friend/cat caregiver, for the Cold War, for evaluating my worth as how skinny I am, for not being enough of ______  (fill in the blank) and too much of _______  (fill in this blank, too).

Now, while I’m worrying about everything little thing I’ve ever done wrong and will ever do wrong in my life, there are people who act like their shit don’t stink.  Because I follow politics, my examples are of politicians and of the so-called pundits who opine about said pols.

First, the song Crazy Bitch by Buckcherry because I need it.  It was suggested to me by one of those FB quizzes.  It’s my stripper song, apparently.

Ok.  Now, on to the screed.

Here are people who need to feel guilty and don’t (the short list because these are the ones who are currently bugging me the most):

1. Pat Rober–er, Buchanan
2. C-Street Mafia
3. Stupid rightwing pundits, especially the hacks such as Ross Douthat and Jonah Goldberg
4. GOP members who questioned Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court spot

First up, Pat Buchanan.  He is considered a prominent Republican for some unfathomable reason.  He has a permanent seat on the MSNBC lineup bench, and he’s frequently seen spouting his vitrolic venom on the webs as well.  His latest hatchet job has been on Sonia Sotomayor for entirely spurious reasons.  I know Rachel calls him “Uncle Pat” and thinks he argues with class, but even she raised her voice at him tonight in the segment on her show in which she called him out on his despicably racist views.  I don’t know how it ended because I clicked to the next video clip (about the C-Street Mafia, ironically) in order to try to tamp down my rage, and then, I got up and punched a wall.

Buchanan made it disgustingly clear that he is a racist fucker who thinks white people are always superior to people of color.  He dismissed all the accomplishments of Sonia Sotomayor (which are vast), and he got angry and defensive when Rachel called him on it.  He thinks that white men are the victims now–hey, Buchanan, quick heat check for you–take a look at the boards of all the big banks and tell me how many non-white men are sitting on them.   Look at the top of any corporation and see how many women of color are there.  Then, come back and fucking talk to me about racism against white men.

He went on to spout how this country was built by white men, how the constitution was written by white men,  and how the wars up until the Battle of…Normandy?  That can’t be right.  I refuse to look it up, though, were fought by white men.   So in other words, white makes right?  Or excuse me, might makes right.  Ed. note: Yes, he said Normandy.  Even though he’s been corrected on that many times before.

Besides, fuck you, Pat Buchanan!  This country was taken from the indigeneous people after a massive genocide.  This country was built on the backs of slaves from Africa and coolies from China.   This country is continuing to be built on the back of migrant workers who come here from Mexico in order to feed their families.  This country was run by white men because they decided it so, not because they were more qualified.  For you to suggest that to have only 2 people of color out of 110 is because the white people fucking deserved it more makes me want to punch you in the face.

I am a pacifist.  An angry, cynical, bitter pacifist, true, but a pacifist, nonetheless.  However, vitriol and smug entitlement like the shit you spew make me see red.  It’s an extension of this (and yes, I’m linking to myself.  So sue me), and Buchanan takes it to its ugly conclusion.

It’s beyond frustrating because there is no way to argue with this mindset.  Anything said in Sotomayor’s defense, for example, can be brushed away with, “affirmative action” and be done with it.  She made it into Princeton and Yale?  Affirmative action.  She graduated summa cum laude at Princeton?  Affirmative action.  She was the editor of the Yale Law Review?  Affirmative action.  Buchanan even trotted out the tired old, “Half the students graduate cum laude from Ivy League schools, Rachel!  I know it and you know it!” line.  By the way, I fucking hate that, “you know it” bullshit.  At least Rachel said, “No, I don’t know it.”  The problem with a bully like Buchanan is that he simply can’t be outshouted (though Larry O’Donnell gave it a hell of a try on a previous show).  Oh, and as for the ridiculous, “half the students graduate cum laude” at Ivy Schools, what a bunch of bullshit.  First of all, summa cum laude is the highest honor one can receive.  It’s not the same as cum laude.  Secondly, I graduated magna cum laude from a much lesser-known school (and Phi Beta to boot), and I worked my ass off (hey, maybe that’s why I don’t have an ass) to get my magna.  In fact, it was because of one messed up semester (my first one) that I didn’t reach summa.  I graduated with a 3.8 something in my major.  That was pretty damn hard, too.  I would have had a perfect 4.0 in my major if it wasn’t for the B I got in my Intro to Psych class and the shittiest prof ever, but no, I’m not still bitter about it, thank you very much.

The point of all my grade-flaunting is that I went to St. Olaf College.  It’s a private liberal arts college here in MN.  It’s a good college, and it has a decent reputation, but it is no Ivy League school.  Plus, at the risk of repeating myself, Sonia Sotomayor attended Princeton at a time when they had a quota limiting the number of women allowed to attend.  Justice Alito was involved in a group who wanted to keep out minorities and women from Princeton.  Maybe “Uncle Pat” and the insufferable bastards of the GOP should have a little chat with him about how Princeton operated back in the day?  They won’t, of course, because it would ruin their story line.

Hm.  This is running long as usual.  I will wrap it up about Pat Buchanan tonight and tackle the other three points on my list in a further entry (entries, most likely).  This is how I feel right now, by the way.  It’s Welcome to the Jungle by Guns N’ Roses, and it takes several seconds to load.

I am tired of MSNBC treating Pat Buchanan like the lovable loony uncle whom everyone avoids at the family reunion.  He is a vile, repellent, ugly, vicious, bitter old man who has lived a life of entitlement and who is now panicking because he’s perceiving that life being yanked out from under his feet.  He can’t fathom a woman of color being equal to (not to mention better than) a white man for any job (except maybe housemaid), especially not one as high as Supreme Court Justice.

In addition,  it was Melissa Harris Lacewell, Princeton associate professor and majorly gorgeous, who went on Olbermann’s show after it was disclosed that Sotomayor belongs (belonged now, she resigned) to an all-women’s professional association  called the Balezian Grove.  Predictably, Rush and others of his ilk mewled, “Imagine if a man belonged to such an all-male group like this.”  Oh, like, say, the Supreme Court?  Or the C-Street Mafia?

Anyway, Melissa Harris-Lacewell makes an important point on Countdown (about a month ago).  The Supreme Court makes decisions that affect all members of society.  Some white men (most likely subconsciously) can’t imagine having their lives affected so by a Latina!  As Harris-Lacewell stated, all white male Supreme Courts  ruled on slavery and immigration.  They got to decide things for people of color and for women for most of our history.  When you have the power, it’s unnerving to give up even a tiny portion of it.

I am disgusted by Pat Buchanan.  I wish MSNBC were, too.  Alas, old white male GOP members can say whatever the fuck they want and not worry about losing their jobs.  How the fuck isn’t that some kind of affirmative action?

Oh, and because I need a small picker-upper after watching “Uncle Fucking Pat” and writing this entry, I give to you, Kylie Minogue.  My fake hubby from BJ posted it there some days ago because he knows I have a (guilty) thing for Kylie Minogue, as does he.  He says if you’re gay and Australian as he is, it’s practically mandated to have a thing for Kylie.  She’s not the best singer, and she’s not my type, but she has a nice butt, and she’s having a blast in this video.  Plus, hot gay boyz.  I love ‘em.  I can’t embed it here, so link for you.  Enjoy.

It was an awful thing that happened.  You know the sick and twisted part?  Many on the right are trying to pretend that the asshole who did this (old asshole, yes, but an unrepentant asshole all his life, nonetheless) was a liberal because–well, it’s the same idiotic pretzel-shaping they did when the converted Muslim man assassinated that soldier.

“You all crammed multiculturalism down our throats, and…”  What?  Apparently, there are some on the far left who blame Jews for what’s ailing America.  I did not know that, and it’s appalling.  However, can you honestly tell me that when you hear of a white supremacist who hates minorities (especially blacks) and Jews and thinks the government is treasonous, who is packing heat and intent on doing damage to the greater population, the first thing you think of is, “Damn fucking liberals are shooting up the joint again!”?

Come on!  We’re not called the bleeding heart liberals for nothing.  The right likes to scoff at us for our empathy and our do-gooder ways.  Now, they want to do a one-eighty and say…I don’t even know what the hell they are trying to say.  Oh, wait.  Yes, I do.  They are saying the alleged killer hated the far right movement, so he must have been far left.  You know why he hated the far-right movement?  Because he thought they were a bunch of wusses who talked a good game, but who weren’t willing to lay it on the line.  The sad thing is that he’s right about that.  Most of the far-right pundits haven’t served their country in any measurable way.  They are not the ones protesting or filling the streets with tea bags.  They are certainly not turning down money from ‘the librul media’ which is paying them a handsome amount to spew their hatred.

Push that aside.  What I want to focus on is the ratcheting up of rhetoric from the far right.  On the very day the alleged shooter allegedly did the deed, Limbaugh was making a joke about Obama’s supposed lack of birth certificate.  Now, I don’t think Limbaugh actually believes that Obama is not an American citizen.  In fact, I would bet that Limbaugh doesn’t believe seventy-five percent of what he says on the air.  However, their is a birther movement that DOES believe Obama is not a US citizen, and therefore, not really president.  In fact, the alleged shooter was a birther.  He thought the Jews created Obama in order to…something.  Still not quite sure what.

Then, Shep Smith, the only sane person on FOX talked about the scary e-mail he receives from the FOX viewers and how some of them are truly nutty.  Now, Shep has been pretty heated in his opposition to the FOX rhetoric, but he still works there.  He acts like it’s just the blogs that stir people up when it’s his very own fucking station.  Naturally, the birthers and freepers and other rightwing nutters are now calling for him to be fired.  Frankly, I want him to stay so that there is one voice of reason on the station, but I think his days are number.

There have always been crazy people who are violent and dangerous.  The problem is, in the old days, they would have been viewed as what they are–crazy.  Now, the blurring between traditional media conservatism, the GOP, and the rightwingers has made it acceptable to voice the most outrageous accusations (such as the birth certificate drama) without any shred of evidence to back you up.  Paul Krugman had a great piece about this very symbiosis today, and he got a lot of heat from Joe Scarborough.  Who, by the way, is one of the biggest idiots on TV.

Of course, this has been said by progressive bloggers and Keith and Rachel for sometime, but the traditional media pooh-poohs the idea.  I think they honestly believe that they are fair and balanced.  Not FOX, though, those fuckers.  We have GOP representatives spouting crazy shit (yes, Ms. Bachmann, I’m looking at you) with a straight face, and no one in their party has the balls or ovaries to say, “Um, maybe we should dial it down a few notches.”

I am sick and tired of Beck and Hannity and Limbaugh and the rest of their ilk bleating about free speech.  Yes, we all have free speech in a loose sense (the part everyone loves to quote is actually about protecting the press from government, and I’m sorry, but there’s no way in hell the three aforementioned can objectively be called the press), but with those rights come responsibilities.  Rachel had an excellent segment on this very issue last night while discussing the shooting.  The whole segment is worth watching, but the little lecture about responsibilities takes place at 4:45.

England and Canada both have laws that outlaw hate speech.  I have seen many Americans, left and right who say that free speech is the most important thing, full stop.    It’s our right.  True, but where the hell is the responsibility?   The same people who call out for free speech were the first ones who told us to sit down and shut the fuck up when W. invaded Iraq.  We were supposed to support our president, no matter what.

Like many things, apparently, it’s just Democrats who need to do this.  For the Republicans, it’s apparently unAmerican to support Obama.  More than that, though, it’s apparently ok to call him worse than al Qaeda (for America) and other such nonsense.  If you wanna say that kind of shit (and by you, I mean Limbaugh, Bachmann, Palin, Jindal, all of the Republican leaders, Hannity, and the list goes on), then you better fucking stand by them when someone acts on them.  You better person up and say, “You know, maybe I went a bit far suggesting that Obama isn’t an American citizen.”

And I don’t want to hear about false equivalency.  Ooooh, you on the left have your crazies, too.  Yes, we do.  You wanna know the main difference?  We don’t fucking kill people for our political views.  I have never heard a crazy terrorist say he listened to Olbermann and Maddow, and that’s why he did what he did.  It doesn’t fucking happen.  So cut out the bullshit.  Seriously.  We went through one fucking civil war in this country.  Let’s try not to start another one.

Dr. Tiller was shot in the nineties, and he continued to do his work.  Late-term abortion?  That’s the particularly grotesque kind, right?  Uh, not exactly.  Dr. Tiller treated women who’s lives were in danger if they continued their pregnancies, who found out that they were further along than they thought they were, and women who were pregnant because of rape and couldn’t get help in time.  

First, let me emphasize that his practice was legal.  Second, his community has tried to get him indicted on performing illegal abortions before and has failed.  Third, Bill O’Reilly focused on Dr. Tiller as did Operation Rescue in their war for forced pregnancies.  Operation Rescue considered Wichita to be some kind of ground zero for their cause.

The right is already spin, spin, spinning.  They are bleating that it would be such a shame if anybody on the left used this as a political weapon–which is exactly what the rightwing shills are doing.  They are going on the offensive as they like to do, but will it work?

I am afraid, yes, it will.  See, Dr. Tiller is already being called an abortion doctor, as if that’s the sole purpose of his practice.  Many of the rightwingnutters don’t even bother to try to understand what exactly Dr. Tiller did.  It didn’t matter.  In that way, he was the symbol of everything they hated, loathed, and feared. 

I am trying not to devolve into a rant against misogynist rightwingers who want to control women’s sexualities and bodies, but it’s very hard for me not to go there.  I am tired of this shit.  I really am.  I will post more later, maybe.  For now, I’m just going to grieve.

This shit needs to stop.

P.S.   I just donated to Planned Parenthood.  You can, too.

So, how am I planning on tying up the loose ends from my previous six entries and summing them up in one neat, coherent, thought?  I’m not.  I’m just going to ramble on some more, as is my wont, and then come to a screeching halt.  I will say one thing in advance of the verbal torrent, though, I want to discuss the impact of religion on my personal life and the impact of religion on my political life.  For the purposes of this blog entry, I am going to assume the two do not overlap.

First up, religion in my personal life.  My friend, Natasha, says she doesn’t take offense at the religious people in her life because they are trying to save her from eternal damnation.  In their minds, her soul is at peril, and they are trying to save it.  I actually agree with this.  I don’t particularly care if people (like my mom) want to pray for my soul.  In fact, it’s sweet when my niece tells me, her eyes wide with concern, “You’ll go to hell” (because I don’t believe Jesus is my savior).  

However, that brings up a sticking point–when do I get to mention my beliefs to my nieces and nephews?  I tried a couple of times when my niece was younger, but I was told by many people that it’s not fair or right of me to tell my niece my beliefs.  It’s like I wouldn’t tell her there is no Santa Claus, right?  Well, no, I wouldn’t, but then is Jesus the religious equivalent of Santa Claus?

In addition, when my niece or nephew wants me to pray, what am I supposed to do?  Make up a prayer?  I simply say, “I don’t pray, but I’ll be happy to listen to you pray.”  That’s the best I can do.  My best friend supports me in my effort to gently let my niece and nephews know that not everyone (meaning, me) is not a Christian, but she is the only one.  

My niece is ten, almost eleven, and I admit I might have told her a little too much when she was too young to understand.  Such as, when she told me her god was the best because he had been around the longest, I said, actually, he hasn’t been around the longest.  I don’t know what I should have said in that situation, though.  Even my therapist doesn’t quite understand why I find it important not to lie about god and my beliefs about the topic.  If I can lie with impunity about Santa Claus (or rather, by omission, since I have never said I believed in Santa Claus), then why can’t I do the same with Christianity and God?  

I have come to the uncomfortable conclusion that it’s because I actually do think there is something harmful with indoctrinating your child about religion–especially when you don’t tell your kids everything about said religion.  For example, my sister-in-law said at Christmas that we celebrate Christmas because it’s Jesus’s birthday.  Well, no, actually, it’s not.  December 25th was chosen as Jesus’s birth date because there was a pagan feast scheduled on that day (celebrating the Sun God).  Christians decided it would be more acceptable for the locals to celebrate Jesus’s birth if it was already a pre-existing holiday.  According to this article, Jesus was born in September/October.   Another very different website comes to the same conclusion.  I have heard June and July as well as probably months of Jesus’s birth.  

Some Christians argue that when Jesus was born isn’t important.   I would concede this point if these same Christians weren’t so damn stubborn in defending nearly everything the Bible says.  There are many contradictions in the Bible itself, yet, many Christians dismiss them or find a way to rationalize them.  One thing I admire about my mother is that she went through a period of disenchantment with Christianity and started studying other religions.   She ultimately went back to Christianity, but it was with a more open mind.  She will readily admit that she doesn’t know for certain whether people of other religions will go to heaven or not.  

I guess in my personal life, I am concerned when I see religion being used as propaganda.  I want people who believe to question what they believe and see if it means something to them personally, or if they are just regurgitating what has been spoon-fed to them.  If a person is going to believe in a religion, I want that person to thoroughly examine said religion.  I also want Christians to act more Christianly, which means being more caring and merciful and less judgmental and harsh.

As for religion in my political life, I am much more strident here.   I think the conversation around abortion and gay marriage (the two hot button issues for the religious right) have been shaped by the rightwingers, and I want to retake the issues and reshape the dialogue–if you can call it that.  In this, I will agree with President Obama.  The goal should be to cut the need for abortions AND for providing for the women who make the choice to carry to term.  Any time a pro-lifer says they are against abortion, he should be asked if he’s for social programs that help poor kids or at-risk youth.  If pro-choice folks want to get down and dirty, we could air ads with children who are grown and poor and have the tag-line, “Why doesn’t my life count?”  Or something to that effect.

As for gay marriage, every time someone trots out, “It’ll harm traditional marriage which is between one man and one woman”, well, there are several ways to attack this.  First, “Divorce!  Have you seen the divorce rates in this country?”  Second, “King David had eight wives.  He slept with the wife of one of his best soldiers, and then had that soldier killed.  King Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines.  Abraham was married to his half-sister and then impregnated her slave at her behest.  Once Sarah got pregnant, Hagar and her son were thrown out.  All of this, apparently, happened with God’s blessings.”  Third, “Newt Gingrich.  Rudy Giuliani.  Ronald Reagan.”

For too long, the religious right has declared itself the keeper of the morality in this country.  The fact that many of them have had mistresses or same-sex affairs or, in general, broken their own moral laws, makes it even more egregious in my mind–not to mention hypocritical.  Let me make myself clear–I don’t give a fuck whom they fuck (at least not from a political stance), but I do give a fuck when they, in turn, try to dictate whom I can and cannot fuck (and how I can fuck said willing partner). 

In addition, I am fucking sick and tired of Christians in the media whining about how they are the oppressed ones.  ”Saying Happy Holidays oppresses Christianity”.  Putting aside the mind-boggling belief that shopping for Christmas presents has anything to do with the true meaning of Christmas, how is being open to other people’s religion/nonreligion oppressive of the dominant religion?

This, however, is the mentality that many people who are in the majority have.  It’s what happened when affirmative action first came into play (and still happens today).  The majority with the privileges see some of those privileges being rescinded, and the majority goes ape-shit because they view their privileges as rights.  It’s what allows white people to talk about all those foreigners taking ‘our’ jobs.  It’s why some straights feel threatened about gay marriage.  It’s why the Christian right in some southern states want to be allowed to put up the ten commandments at their capitol buildings, but who would be the first to pitch a fit if text from the Qur’an was allowed to be installed as well.

Ok.  I don’t have a solution or a conclusion, really.  What it comes down to is that I will struggle to find a way to be respectful with Christians in my personal life, but I won’t afford the same luxury to the religious right.  I view them as harmful to American politics and to our society in general.  It’s rather similar to how they view me–only I don’t have a book to back me up.  That’s fine with me.  I will use my conscience to guide me through the mindfield that is life, instead.  

That’s it.  The end.  So speaketh Minna.  Tomorrow, I will be returning to my regular random blogging.

Now, in case you don’t know, the talking heads were all up in arms (figuratively, and perhaps, literally) over the idea of a pro-choice president speaking at a Catholic university.  Oh, the horrors!  Newt Gingrich weighed in.   Bill Donohue weighed in.  Pat Buchanan weighed in.  Oh, and he got smacked down by Larry O’Donnell who wasn’t having any of Pat’s nonsense.  Other Catholics weighed in, but I don’t have the stomach to list them all.  When I Googled Obama, Notre Dame, and students, the first gazillion links are about protesting Obama or the controversy over his invitation, as it were.   Mostly, the indignation has to do with the fact that Obama is pro-choice and pro-science.  Anti-life, as it were.

Still, would it surprise you to know that all of this outrage is mainly within the Village and that Catholics, on the whole, support Obama?  So do the students of Notre Dame.  Hell, the valedictorian herself is glad to have Obama speak at the graduation.  Little known fact, the word catholic, as an adjective means free from provincial prejudices or attachments.  In other words, open to new ideas.

Besides, they had W. speak at their 2001 commencement speech, and during his six years as governor of Texas, 152 prisoners on death row were executed.  How is this in line with the pro-life crowd?  In fact, I have never understood how someone can be both pro-life and pro-death penalty.

Anyway, President Obama stepped up to the plate and hit a home run.  He was gracious to his detractors, and he used his well-honed self-deprecating humor to take the edge off the situation.  He was eloquent and inspiring, without veering into cloying.

Here is Part II:

Of course, the speech was heavy with Christian terminology, but I expected that.  After all, he’s talking at Notre Dame.  However, he did slip in a shout-out to nonbelievers.  I was happy to hear that, even if my best friend would be indignant on my behalf.  She doesn’t like the term nonbeliever because many of us agnostics believe in something–just not any of the designated religions.

President Obama didn’t skirt by the abortion issue, either.  He brought it out into the open.  After laying down the inescapable truth that the two camps are pretty much mutually-exclusive, he said we can at least try to treat each other with respect and understanding.  As he is wont to do, he relayed a personal story that underscored his point.  Most people on either side of the great divide are not evil, spawn of the devil.  We can disagree without being disagreeable.

I have to admit, that it’s difficult for me to be civil when faced with much of the pro-life rhetoric.  The inner bitch in me wants to say something like, “Fuck you, asshole.  You’re not the one who’ll have to deal with the consequences if I get fucking pregnant,” and, “So you only give a fuck about a mass of cells that float around in a woman’s body.  You don’t give an actual fuck about the woman who’s pregnant or what happens to the mass of cells once they become born.  Duly noted.”  However emotionally satisfying that would be, it wouldn’t be very productive or conducive to conversation.

Another part of Obama’s speech that I loved was how he told the faithful to use reason as much as possible when debating their positions.  This is what I want from Christians.  You believe gay marriage will be the downfall of civilized society?  Give me a reasonable answer, not just, “God said it was a sin,” and, “Oh my god, teh buttsecks!!!!!!”  Neither of these is reasonable in my mind.  Even within the rubric of Christianity, the first doesn’t hold water.  There are many things God has labeled a sin that Christians don’t try to outlaw–like divorce.   As for the second, well, that is a completely emotional response to which there is no sane answer.

Oh, and unreasonable is Representative Paul Broun of Georgia.  He proposed a resolution to call 2010, “The Year of the Bible”.  Check out the first item under This Week in God.  Here is my favorite excerpt:

“The bill seeks to have the president designate 2010 as the Year of the Bible and “to issue a proclamation calling upon citizens of all faiths to rediscover and apply the priceless, timeless message of the Holy Scripture which has profoundly influenced and shaped the United States and its great democratic form of Government.”

Pardon me for channeling my inner Keith Olbermann, but what the fuck?????  Oh, and I added the bold/italics/underline for emphasis (the downside to using yellow writing on black).  How the fuck am I supposed to take this man seriously when he wants people of all faiths to…convert?  Spout something in which they don’t believe?  I’m not sure I even know what the fuck he’s trying to say here.  Leave it to the dear readers of Balloon Juice, however, to come up with the best snark and the best solution to this stupid-ass resolution.   This is a deeply un-serious and unreasonable resolution and one guaranteed to make non-Christians pissed off as well.

I will agree with the commenters of various blogs who say, fine.  Follow that up with the Year of the Qur’an, the Year of the Torah, the Year of the Vedas, along with whatever other religions feel like they want to participate.  Then, there has to be the Year of No Religion, so as to be fair to us agnostics and atheists.

I would think true believers would find it bothersome as well.  I mean, do they really need a resolution to tell them to revere their Book of Faith of choice?  If so, then I would argue that their religion isn’t very well-grounded in the first place.  In fact, I would again defer to President Obama in that he said people with faith have to acknowledge that they cannot know with certainty what is out there.  They need to be humble and always questioning their faith.  Ok, I takced on the last part, but I think he meant it in spirit.

The problem with President Obama’s inspiring speech, however, is that I don’t think many in the political arena are going about their business in good faith.  In other words, those who are the faces of the religious right (James Dobson, I’m looking at you!) aren’t people who are about love, compassion, and doing the right thing.  From what I’ve observed of them and read, part of their identity as Christians is being able to point to others in condemnation.    Here is Dobson on his reaction to the election of President Obama.  Here is Dobson’s litmus test for who is godly and who isn’t.  Here is Dobson railing againts a godless liberal judge–who is a Catholc and a Republican.  And, of course, here is Dobson on the ever-popular issue of same-sex marriage.  Oh, and my personal favorite, here is Dobson including bisexuality as a supposed sexual disorder according to the APA.  As I pointed out on a blog, um, no.   Here is a list of the APA Guidelines to dealing with clients who are lesbian, gay, or bisexual.  The first one states:

“Psychologists understand that homosexuality and bisexuality are not indicative of mental illness.”

So, you can see that James Dobson is a big fat lying sack of shit.  In addition, the APA released a statement on a study that concludes that bisexuality is not just a transitional phase for women.  In other words, the APA does not view bisexuality as a disorder or perversion.  In other other words, James Dobson can bite me.  Oops.  So much for civil discourse.

Now, many people probably are saying, “Hey, Minna.  Not all Christians subscribe to James Dobson’s crazy-ass view of Christianity.”  I would say, “You are so right.  Then again, it’s not the reasonable rational Christians who make the daily news, is it?”  No, it’s the religious rightwingers who hog center stage.  By the way, I have no idea why anyone ever gave Pat Buchanan a microphone, but it’s about time to take it away.  I know Rachel calls him “Uncle Pat” and respects the way he debates, but he’s an antique.  He needs to be put on the shelf.

Again.  I am running long.  I will wrap this all up tomorrow.  For now, here’s the closing of President Obama’s speech.  He is a much better promoter of understanding and respectful discourse than am I.  Plus, he doesn’t say fuck nearly as often.

I have made my peace, for the most part, with Christianity.  I no longer hate God (with a capital G) or am mad at Him.  However, I am more than a bit concerned about his supposed followers.

First, a little musing.  We have spent the last eight years waging a war against terror.   We were told by the last president that al-Qaeda hated us for our freedoms.  They were the radical ones who believed the ends justified the means.  Whatever it took for them to get their seventy-two virgins in heaven (or whatever the number is these days) was fine.  They were the Taliban jihadists who would use any excuse to bomb the hell out of us.  They were evil, evil, evil you hear?  They must be eradicated.  And so, we tortured prisoners in order to force them to confirm what we thought we already knew–there was a link between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein.  Then, we invaded Iraq.

So, wait a minute.  Cheney had an end goal of invading Iraq.  He manufactored evidence to give us an excuse to invade Iraq.  We invaded.  Thousands of American soldiers have died because of this.  What is so different in the two lines of thinking?  Granted, W. was the president, so we can’t let him off the hook, either.  Here are some of W.’s greatest hits concerning God, religion, and the role of the government when it comes to religion.

W. in explaining to Palestinan ministers why he invaded Afghanistan and Iraq:

“I’m driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, “George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.” And I did, and then God would tell me, “George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq …” And I did. ”

Also from W. to Palestinian Authority Prime Minister:

“God told me to strike at al Qaeda and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam [Hussein], which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East. If you help me I will act, and if not, the elections will come and I will have to focus on them.”

W. speaking about his support for faith-based programs:

“What we are going to do in the second term is to make sure that the grant money is available for faith communities to bid on, to make sure these faith-based offices are staffed and open. But the key thing is, is that we do have the capacity to allow faith programs to access enormous sums of social service money, which I think is important.”

There are more, but that’s the gist of his approach.  God told him to do things, so he did ‘em.  He got ‘er done.  He didn’t allow for anyone to dissent with his opinion.  He pretty much had an end point in sight, and he didn’t much care how he got there.  In the wake of his decision, thousands of American soldiers have been killed, not to mention hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, civilians included.

So, if we are going to be fair, let’s look at the Iraqi invasion from the Iraqi point of view.  Americans invaded their country under fictitious pretenses, killed thousands of their civilians, and basically strong-armed the strong man out of authority.  Then, a leader was chosen who is too weak to really be a leader.   Women still have shitty lives (if not shittier), and people are being driven out of Iraq in large numbers.  We are still mired in the muck there, our contractors have made an obscene amount of money off the invasion while our soldiers are struggling to just get the water they need to drink, and W. has the gall to say that God told him to invade Iraq?

Can you say, hypocrite, boys and girls?  Ooooh.  I just noticed that I had 666 words at the end of that last question.  Spooky!

Anyway, I just needed to get that out there before I returned to the more personal angle.  Why is religion taboo?  What I mean is, when someone tells you she is a Christian, there’s an underlying assumption then that she is not supposed to be questioned further about her beliefs.  For example, if I am talking with someone about gay marriage, if that person is a devout Christian, usually the defense against it is, “It’s a sin” or, “The Bible says it’s wrong.”  For that person, trotting out the Bible is her end point.  For me, it’s a non-starter.  I don’t believe in the Bible, so if her arguments are based on it, I don’t buy her arguments, either.  Yet, social etiquette frowns upon me pointing out this point to her.  Somehow, I am the rude one if I say that I don’t believe in the Bible.  Yet, we can’t have an honest discussion if I can’t make that simple statement.  

In addition, while a Christian like, say, Carrie Prejean can say whatever the fuck she wants on the stupid-ass Miss USA pageant, but, and listen very carefully Miss Implants because this is the important part, everyone else has the same right to say whatever they want about what she said.  Let’s put aside that the First Amendment was not protecting the rights of a beauty pageant to say what she wants on some soft-porn sleaze-fest.   Here is my point.  You can say pretty much the fuck whatever you want to say, as long as it’s not incendiary.  However, if I don’t like what you say, then I can fucking say that you’re a fucking idiot.  Otherwise, only you have free speech, and what the fuck good does that do me?

The only reason I care about Prejean is because of the hypocrisy of the whole thing.  She’s trying to paint herself as this moral, upright Christian (God talks to her, too, apparently) who is shocked that pics of her almost nude were leaked.  She is only for “opposite-sex” marriage because in her country, that’s what’s right.  But other people can choose differently.  Uh, in your “country” of California, Carrie, no, they cannot.  Your people voted against it, remember?  

In addition, she’s a contestant on a beauty show, for which she got implants–paid for by the people of her “country”.  This is obviously an embellishment on the body that God gave her–oh, hell.  Even I can’t spout that crap or keep up with the hypocrisy here.  The fact that she’s talking about gay marriage at all should be irrelevant, so I’m moving on.

Here’s the thing:  I don’t care what religion people are.  I really don’t.  If you want to worship at the altar of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, then it’s fine by me.  The only time I do care is when your religion starts seeping into my life.  I feel like I shouldn’t have to say this, but our country’s forefathers believed in the separation of church and state.   The fundies would do well to remember that when they are pushing to enact all these damn laws that would foist their religious beliefs onto the rest of America.  

Hm.  Running long again.  Surprise, surprise.  This was a bit disjointed.  Sorry for that.   Join me for Part VI tomorrow.

I started taking a tai chi class.  It was taught by my friend, and I was intrigued.  It’s where I met Natasha, who I started calling Sis.  Our mutual friend, let’s call him Glen, was an excellent teacher.  Unfortunately, the class only lasted six weeks, and then I had to move on to the main teacher.  Let’s call him Robert, because that’s his name.

He set off  my creepy meter from the start.  The first time I met him, I knew there was something very off about him.  He had the typical predator/con man vibe, but I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt for Glen’s sake.  Robert was very New-Agey, and he exuded the smarmy smugness of an snake-oil salesman.  I stayed with it for over a year, despite my misgivings, until I just couldn’t shake the heebie-jeebies any longer.  Every time I went, I had to erect mental barriers so I wouldn’t be bothered by Robert’s energy.  He liked to claim that he and his teachers knew when not to touch someone during practice, but they certainly didn’t know that with me.  In addition, Robert had no concept of personal space.  In other words, major creep.

Still, I liked the tai chi itself, so I tucked that knowledge into the back of my mind for further examination.  

One religion that has always been attractive to me is Wiccan.  I read more about it, and I liked elements of it, but it felt too artificial to me.  In addition, I tried the goddess thing, but that felt awkward as well.  I liked goddess better than god, but that wasn’t saying much.  I tried to pray to the goddess, to the goddesses, to Kuan Yin, to Kali, but it was all to no avail.

I have to interject that my semester abroad was to study Buddhism in different Asian countries.  We went to Hong Kong for a few days, Japan for a week, China for a week, Taiwan for three weeks, then two months in Thailand.  In was amazing to see the magnificent Buddhist temples and to study the differences in the practice of Buddhism in the different countries.  In addition, it was interesting to note the way that many people practiced folk Buddhism, much as many Christians in this country adhere to the rituals, but not the philosophies of their faith.

I grappled with Buddhism because I felt as if it should be in my spiritual blood.  I mean, my ancestors were Buddhists, and my dad’s sister is very devout.  Which makes for much awkwardness between my mother and her sister-in-law.  I didn’t connect to Buddhism, though.  I liked some tenets of it (such as being present in every moment and detaching from the situation), but I couldn’t embrace it as a whole.

So.  Back in the States, I began dabbling in the occults.  I started reading tarot cards.  I have tried many decks over the years, but the Crowley-Thoth deck was the one that felt the best.  Yes, it’s the standard and very traditional, but it fit me.  I have many other decks that are pretty or meaningful in other ways, but the Crowley Toth deck is my reading deck.  A funny anecdote:  The ex-friend from California gave me a deck for my birthday.  When I tried to use it, a sense of evil emanated from it.  I tried a few times, but I could never use it.  It should have been a warning, but I paid no attention.

Anyway, I also started reading runes.  Still later yet, I began to scry.  What is scrying?  Well, you know about crystal balls, right?  That’s scrying.  It’s reading a smooth surface for hints of the future.  Here is a quick primer of the basics to scrying.  I found out that I have the best results with scrying black mirrors.  Crystals work in a pinch, but crystal balls aren’t that conducive for me.  I picked up scrying rather quickly.  I can now do it without a medium.  Sometimes, it happens now during my current tai chi practice.  

What is remarkable to me about my occult practices is how mundane they are.  I only do the basics, and I rarely perform a ritual ahead of time.  I’m more of a practical practitioner, and I don’t like frills.  I find myself tapping into something bigger, something collective when I scry, or read tarot cards/runes.  Time is very fluid when I scry.  I have let it lapse lately, but I would like to pick it up again.  It centers me, and it actually soothes my agitated mind.  I think this is what most people want from religion, anyway–to be free of agitation.

I started noticing how beautiful the world was.  Not the people, necessarily, but the scenery.  I noticed how heartbreakingly breathtaking a magnificent sunset could be.  The juice of a sweet strawberry running down my chin brought me joy.  These moments were far and few between, but they were real.  They made me realize that there is something bigger than me.  Is it God with a capital G?  Is it Allah?  Yahweh?  Siva?  Kali?  Kuan Yin?  Any or all of the above?  

I don’t know.  I am taking tai chi again, with Julie from 7 Stars T’ai Chi Ch’uan Studio.  She doesn’t emphasize the spiritual aspect of tai chi, but I feel it, anyway.  When I practice tai chi, I feel that same connection–even if it’s only for a brief second.  Even with the thoughts whizzing through my head, I manage to find snatches of calm and/or intense awareness.  I fully expect that this will happen more often and for longer durations the more I study tai chi.

I call myself an agnostic deist, and I’ve had people ask me what that means.  Some people think an agnostic is a polite atheist in that an agnostic doesn’t really believe in God, but doesn’t want to offend people by saying so.  Maybe for other agnostics, but not for me.  I know there is something bigger than me.  That is where the deist part comes in.  I acknowledge there is a god-like entity/ies in the ethos.  I just don’t know what form that takes.  That’s where the agnostic part comes in.  I don’t know, and you know what?  That’s fine with me.  I expect I will wrestle more with the issue of god/spirituality in the future, but for now, I am comfortable sitting with the unknown.

Ok.  That was waaay too fucking long.  Tomorrow, I tackle the political aspect of religion.

So, in college, religion was put on the backburner as I spent more and more time discovering, well, me.  And my boyfriend, D, but that’s not really the main part of this blog entry.

So, after we had sex and I wasn’t struck dead by lightning, I began to wonder what else I had been taught that was not strictly true.  You would think at this point that I would have went wild with the booze and the drugs, but my breeding still held.  It wasn’t just being raised Christian, though, it also had to do with being the daughter of immigrants who came from a more puritanical culture (at least on the outside).  I did start thinking about what I actually believed, rather than what I’d been told.

I believed in keeping abortions legal.  It was never something I discussed with my parents or with teachers in school.  I have always been pro-choice–even before I knew what the phrase meant.   Likewise, I have always been a Democrat.  I grew up, for the most part, under Reagan, and I never understood what people saw in him.  Every time I looked at him, I was always struck at how empty he was.  There was no there, there.  

I knew that people should be treated equally, and that just because someone was rich, powerful, beautiful, famous, whatever, s/he was not inherently superior to someone who was not any of those things.  I was always puzzled by the hierarchies of our society.  Incidentally, this is one reason I could never get into Catholicism (not to mention the difficulty I have with the inherent sexism and homophobia of the religion).  I just don’t truck with the idea that a position bestows upon a person a measure of worth.  Take W. for example.  People used to say that you had to respect W. because he was president.  No, I don’t.  I respect the position of presidency, which is why I loathe what W. did to drag down said position.

Ok.  Another reason I have difficulty with religion is because of the certainty.  Talk to a Christian, and she will tell you she just ‘knows’ there’s a heaven.  Every Christian has a slightly different take on what that heaven will look like, however, so how can they be certain that any of them are correct?  Well, we’re not smart enough to grasp the details.  See, there it is again–the dichotomy that is woven throughout Christianity (I speak of Christianity because it’s the religion I know best)–Christians take it as fact that God exists, but any jarring statements in the Bible are dismissed as irrelevant or unknowable.  Just the other day, my niece asked if I believed that Jesus was the son of God.  When I said I didn’t, she said, “But you’ll go to hell then.”  What confidence she has, and she’s only ten (almost eleven).  

I met D’s parents, and it was clear that they disapproved of me not being Sri Lankan.  I was so busy trying to impress them because they are a Very Important Family in Sri Lanka, I forgot that my family was pretty fucking important in its own right, and who the fuck were they to judge me?  They were Christians, and yet, there was nothing very Christianly about their behavior.  This is a theme I have noticed more and more, especially in the public discourse of religion.  If Christ was real and came back today, do you think the religious right would embrace Him?  Hell, no.  They would call him a damn socialist and accuse him of being an enemy of the country.  Remember, Jesus talked to the untouchables of the time.  He believed in taking care of others who were less fortunate than oneself.  He said it was easier for a camel to pass through an eye of a needle than it was for a rich man to get into heaven.  He DID NOT say anything about gay marriage or abortions, two issues which are very near and dear to the heart of the current religious right.  

Back to D.  He dumped me three times and came back to me twice.  The first time he wanted to get back together, I was dating someone else and trying to move on with my life.  The second time was probably sex-driven to a certain extent.  When he broke up with me for a third time, I had every reason to believe that he would want to get back together.  He didn’t.  I was devastated.  I also questioned myself as to how I could have been so wrong.  I was also immature in that I thought if there was a God (with a capital G), then He didn’t really care much about me.

Then, I went abroad.  Bad things happened.   I became convinced that if there was a God (again with the capital G), then not only did He not give a shit about me, He fucking hated me.  I graduated with a burning anger at God, and that lasted for several years.  Unfortunately, my mother was in the process of defending her faith at this time, and she was quite vocal about it.  One time, in the car, she went on and on about God and wouldn’t shut up, so I told her I didn’t give a damn about her God.  She made me get out and walk home, which suited me just fine.  It was only a mile, anyway.

For several years, I was angry at God and hurt by God.  I started openly rebelling against Him.  I had done a bit of drinking while I was abroad in Asia, and I tried smoking for the first time.  Regular cigarettes, not marijuana.  Upon my return to the States, I also decided to explore my homoerotic nature.  I discovered my physical attraction to women while I was dating D, but I didn’t want to deal with it on top of grappling with racial issues and my burgeoning awareness of feminist issues.  It was only in my state of ‘anything goes’ along with what I affectionately refer to as my slut years that I finally announced my bisexuality.  

During this time, I slept around.  I got back into theatre, which I adore.  I started doing guerilla performances in which someone would call me up to tell me about a gig; I would create a performance, perfect it, and then perform it on the given day.  I smoked a cigarette a day.  Yes, one.  I drank more often.  I freed myself from my upbringing, but much of it was in direct opposition to God.  I was telling Him, “I don’t give a fuck if You hate me.  See how much I don’t give a fuck?”  

It’s much the same as a teenager rebelling against her parents–which I never did.  I claimed not to believe in Him, but oh, I did.  I fucking hated Him, and every mention of God, Christianity, the Bible, or Jesus sent me into a black rage.  I hated all the shit being done in His name, but I hated it even more that other people were loved by God when He only had disdain and contempt for me.  It didn’t seem fair that if He created me, He should hate me so much.  I felt very much like the abused child who acts out because she is impotent to get back at her parents in any other way.  

Fortunately, I did not do anything truly stupid during my rebellious phase.  There were no lasting scars from that period, and I learned a lot about myself and what I truly believed.  

I will share more in part four tomorrow.

I became good friends with a few girls in my corridor (we had corridors our first year, and each corridor had to Junior Counselors (JCs) who helped us first-years navigate the waters), and I became tight with many guys.  In my younger years, I found it easier to relate to boys than girls.  My female friends in college used to ask me how I got to be friends with so many guys.  I said, “I treat them like people.”  Most of my female friends never quite understood what I was saying.

I quit going to church the minute I went to college.  I had to take a few religion classes, but I dealt with that.  I really liked one of my religion profs, John Barbour, if I remember correctly, because he had fun questioning the creeds and the tenets.  I had him my junior year, and he told the class that he liked to start out his first-year classes with this thought:  ”God committed infanticide.”  The minute he told us that, he had me hooked.

Anyway, back to my faith and life in college.  God was pushed to the periphery, if he was ever central to me at all.  I went about my merry business flirting with the boys, going to class, being a front desk monitor as part of my work study program, and in general, living it up.  I didn’t give much thought to God, except as a built-in guilt tester.  I didn’t drink, smoke, do drugs, or have sex in my first year of college.  I was, quite frankly, a prude at the time–even though I no longer believed in the Christian God.

I have to take a break so I can describe to you the casual hypocrisy I found at the Bible School camp I attended.  Yes, it’s just one incident, but I found it sadly indicative of the mindset of Christians I knew in general.  In fact, I don’t think much has changed.  Look at the so-called Christian folks who prance around in the spotlight.  Would you want to break bread with any of them?  I sure wouldn’t.  The far-right religious wingers remind me of my early vision of God–steely-eyed, pursed mouth of disapproval, and a checklist of all the things you do wrong.

So, at the camp, we had a Bible verse competition in which each kid tried to recite the most Bible verses by memory.  It was divided down the gender line so boys only competed against boys and girls against girls.  On the girls side, it came down to me and one other girl.  I was 16, and she was 14 . I was Asian and gawky, and she was white and cute as a button.  The rules were that each girl had to recite the verse perfectly by memory (probably from the King James Bible, but I’m not positive on that) without any prompting or help from the counselors.  

When the other girl, let’s call her Mary, started struggling, the counselors began feeding her a word or two.  When I protested, they said that it was fair because she was younger.  I got no prompting or cues, and she eventually ‘won’.  The prize was a camera, and I was mad.  No coaching means no coaching, except, I guess, when it means coaching.  Sound familiar?  The rules are set in stone, unless we do something against the rules–and then it doesn’t count.  Yes, I’m still bitter about it.  

Ok.  Back to college.  My first year, I still hung on to the trappings of my religion, even though I no longer bought the tenets.  Even though I no longer believed in a God who sits up in the sky and judges me, I still acted as if I would be struck dead if I wavered from the path of righteousness.  I would lecture anyone else who drank as if I were some kind of moral authority.  It’s funny in retrospect, but I was probably a big, fat, pain in the ass at the time.  

Second year.  I was a little bit older, and not a whole lot wiser.  I was dealing with an eating disorder, and I was pissed off about not having a boyfriend.  In addition, I started to realize that I was Asian, and I was pissed about the racism that surrounded me.  I started dating a Sri Lankan I’ll call D (because that’s what I called him), who was himself a Christian.  He told me from the beginning that he couldn’t marry me because he had to marry someone Sri Lankan, but I ignored his caveat.  I knew he was the man I meant to marry.  He was my soulmate, the man God had sent for me.  Yeah, yeah, yeah, I didn’t believe in God, but that didn’t mean I didn’t still cling to my old beliefs.

I started hanging out with his friends who were mostly Indians from India and Hindu.  It was the first time I had been around people who weren’t Christians, and it was an eye opener for me.  I immersed myself into the Asian community, and I started divorcing myself from my upbringing.  I watched as a Christian pastor told my Hindu friend that she was going to hell.  I watched as people partied hard Saturday night, only to show up in chapel with blood-shot eyes the next morning.  I did go once in awhile.  I hated the fact that every sidewalk led to the chapel, but as someone pointed out, all the sidewalks led away from it, as well.  I realized it was true, and it was like a weight had been lifted from my heart.

That same year, I started questioning the idea of children.  I quickly concluded that I didn’t want them, and I moved on to the idea of marriage.  That was a little more squishy for me because I loved D, and I thought the natural progression of a relationship ended at the altar.  Early in our relationship, he wanted to have sex with me.  He was a virgin as was I.  I demurred for several reasons.  It was only after we had broken up once (over the summer) and gotten back together the next year that we finally had sex.  You know what?  I didn’t get struck by lightning, nor did the Hand of God did not come down to smite me.   Instead, I found out pretty quickly that I really liked sex.  A lot.  It was one of the best things I’d ever done.  It got me thinking as to why I hadn’t done it earlier.

Ok.  We are running long again.  I’m going to wrap this up for now and return to it tomorrow.

Once upon a time, there was an island named Formosa.  Most of the inhabitants on the island were Buddhists.  However, the Dutch people, then the English Presbytarians, then the Canadian Presbytarians sent missionaries to the island.  So now, even though the vast majority of Taiwanese are Buddhist, Confucian and/or Taoist, approximately 5%  of the population is Christian.  

My mother is one of that 5%.  She was raised Christian.  My dad is one of the 93% that is Buddhist/Confucian/Taoist.  He was raised Buddhist.  My mother went to church and prayed to God.  My father went to his ancestors’ graves and paid homage to them.  They met in Tennessee, and my father converted to please my mother.  He has never been what I would call a spiritual person, so I suspect it was easier for him to convert than for him to convince my mother to convert.

Fast-forward many years.  They moved to Minnesota so my dad could get his Ph.D. in economics.  They met other Taiwanese people who also came to the States for educational purpose.  Most of them were Christians.  They weren’t satisfied with the Chinese Church, so they decided to start a church of their own.  It was a branch of the Evangelical Formosan Church, which originates in LA.  Our branche was called the Evangelical Formosan Church in the Twin Cites, EFCTC for short.

I went there for all of my childhood.  I tried to believe–I really did.  I went to Bible school camp, and I would be swept up in the groupthink fervor that always accompanies any kind of camp.  I would vow to carry the feeling home with me, but it inevitably faded within a few days.  Then, I went back to my doubting self.  I tried to talk to God, but He (and it was a He at the time) didn’t bother answering.

When I realized that one day, I wouldn’t exist any more (I was seven), I used to jump out of bed and scream in abject terror.  I still do from time to time.  It boggles my mind to think that I will go from a sentient, feeling being to–nothing.  And so, I looked to the church to soothe that fear.  I found out that if I believed in God, I would go to Heaven.  Saved!  But wait, I can’t believe in God just to go to Heaven–I have to believe in God…just because.  If I believe in God just to go to Heaven, then it wasn’t enough.  

WTF?  If I don’t believe in God, I go to Hell.  If I believe in God because I don’t want to go to Hell, I will still go to Hell.  However, if I believe in God because…well, just because, then I go to Heaven.  That’s seriously stacking the deck against me, now isn’t it?

In addition, I was supposed to believe that God gave a shit about me personally.  Well, I could clearly see that wasn’t true.  I mean if God cared about each person individually, why did so many people suffer horrific lives?  My pastor and others tried to explain that if there wasn’t evil, there wouldn’t be good.  If we didn’t have free will, then what was the point?  I would counter that we didn’t have free will, not really, because the choice is believe or go to Hell.  That’s not really much of a choice, is it?  Then, there was the whole if you think it, you’ve done it angle.  If me thinking about robbing a bank for a million dollars is the same as me actually doing it, then why not just go rob the bank and beg for mercy after?   Kinda like what Wall Street is doing right now, except, they aren’t doing the begging for mercy bit.

In addition, I was told that I couldn’t get to Heaven on good deeds alone.  I had to believe.  Then why the hell would I do any good deeds at all?  Why not just do shitty things all my life and atone at the last minute?  I mean, Hitler was Catholic, and Jeffrey Dahmer repented before he was killed in prison.  The only danger with this approach is that I would have to make sure to get my atonement in before dying.  

Religion never made much sense to me.  I struggled with it all through my childhood.  I was told to believe in this mythical being in the sky who knew everything I was thinking and who was judging every thought I had and every deed I did.  No wonder I feared doing anything wrong!  In my mind, there was nothing I could do right when it came to God.  He was the stern, forbidding, distant father who judged everything I did with a disapproving eye.  No matter how hard I tried (and believe me, I tried), I could not believe in God just because.  I could only try to believe in God so I wouldn’t go to hell.

Funny anecdote.  Once, when I was a kid, I was having a massive allergy attack.  I asked my mom why God invented allergies, and I never got an answer.  It didn’t make sense to me then, and it doesn’t make sense to me now.  Nothing about Christianity made sense to me–not the stories nor the morals nor the contradictions.

It didn’t help that I felt like an outcast at my church.  I was always on the outside of the group of girls because I simply wasn’t interested in the same things.  When I was a teenager, I didn’t even know how to begin to pretend to fit in, so I often just stood to the sidelines and watched the action rather than participate.  Still, I kept going to church because my mother made me, and I grew to dislike it more with each passing week.

The boiling point happened when we were having Bible study night.  Our youth pastor had been wild in his youth (he was American, so naturally, he was wild in his youth), and he was trying to get us to not go down the same path.  He told us that we shouldn’t even hold hands on a date because holding hands led to sex.  Now, I was a virgin at the time, but even I knew that there were plenty of steps between holding hands and sex.

Side tangent–I really hated the fact that the church taught that sex was dirty and sinful and gross–until you got married.  Then, it was mystical and wonderful and sacred.  Really.  A piece of paper has that much power, does it?  It’s because of the no sex before marriage dictum that I became a TV–technical virgin.  I did everything BUT have penile penetration into my vagina, and I thought I was still a virgin.  It was a matter of inches, really.  Just as these days, kids saddleback (have anal or oral sex) in order to ’save’ their virginity.  Or rather, her virginity.

Back to Bible study.  Then, one of the girls asked very seriously why there was evil in the world.  There were several things the youth pastor could have said.  He could have said that there has to be evil to balance the good.  He could have said that without evil, we wouldn’t really have a choice or free will.  Hell, he could have said that life would be boring without evil in it.  He could have said any of those things, but no.  He didn’t.  Instead, he said, “God works in mysterious ways,” and that did it for me.  I continued to give lip service to being a Christian, but I wasn’t.

Then, I attended St. Olaf College, and any attempts at charade quickly faded.  Since this is getting to be really long, I will conclude her and pick up tomorrow with the fascinating story of how attending a Lutheran college turned me off Christianity once and for all.