PERFECT BALLOT: ROBERTSON/NAGIN
Wow, just when you thought things couldn't get whackier, here comes New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin saying that God smote New Orleans. Nagin joins Republican preacher Pat Robertson in the nut job club; Robertson earlier had said that gay pride parades would bring hurricanes to Florida and that Hurricane Katrina had targeted New Orleans because Ellen DeGeneres was the host of the Emmy Awards show. Robertson has also blamed natural disasters as God's revenge for abortion.
So we're back to the Old Testament Yahweh. God is tired of Time cover stories asking if He is dead, or Kurt Vonnegut's interesting take on God as semi-retired (Vonnegut invents the "Church of God the Utterly Indifferent" in Sirens of Titan), and has taken matters back into His own hands.
I'm not convinced. Why would an omnipotent Creator choose to kill His own handiwork willy nilly? Are we being pruned, like a gardener would prune an arbor vitae? Take a little off Pakistan, a little off New Orleans, a little off Banda Aceh? Is God an abusive parent, like the drunk father who whales on his kids every Friday night after about eight good pops at the local bar? Is God the kind of parent who holds His son's hands in the flames of the stove because the boy was caught smoking? What then of all those tornadoes that flatten good Christian towns in the Bible Belt? If God isn't responsible for them, is someone else? Is it Satan? Ellen DeGeneres?
Whatever God is -- and there's no way the human mind can fathom an Almighty, no matter what the various religious texts on the planet might say -- it strikes me that He would take to smiting cities only if He were as imperfect as his creation. And while it is believed we are made in God's image, I really hate to think that our flaws are also God-like. I'd like to think that if God found my wallet, He'd return it without taking out the cash first.
So here's the deal. I'm going to go back to doing the best job I can not to kill, maim, or hurt anybody; to help folks who need it when I can; and to do what I can to make the world a better place. I wish Ray Nagin and Pat Robertson would make that their mission, too.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
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3 comments:
Don't know if you are aware of this, but the right wing bloggers jumped all over the Nagin story. Their concern seemed to be, "Boy, all those liberals condemn Pat Robertson when he says something like this, but how come none of them are saying anything about Ray Nagin?" Which is funny to me, because it shows that they never get outside of their echo chamber. I have read and heard numerous liberals berating Nagin, but I have yet to hear of a single Christian right winger attack Pat. Which to me points out the biggest difference between liberals and conservatives: liberals will attack their own for stupidity, but right wingers will never admit that anyone on their side can possibly be do anything wrong.
I'm willing to accept that the way the universe is creates the possibility that it has a Creator. That being said, I'm also willing to accept that there's no way the human mind could wrap around one.
Sometimes I think of the universe and God and Sim City. I've played Sim City, enjoying how my little Sims grow and develop and build, watching them, pushing them. I am their creator, and yet, I can't watch everything and can't do everything and I'm not interested in everything. It wouldn't surprise me that a Supreme Being might favor one planet over another, even subconsciously. But maybe in the great Sim City game of the ultimate universe, our little ecosystem was built, and prospered, and no longer needed Divine attention. So on to the next challenge. As for Jesus, whether or not He is the messiah and the Son of God, there's nothing wrong with the philosophy we were given to take and to use. Show me a more powerful message than the Golden Rule and I'll root for the Mets.
So, as usual, the problem isn't the message but the messenger.
Generally I'm with you, Frank; I just don't like to fall into the same trap as the religiously blind. Just because they believe they're right and they need to save you and me by imposing their belief system on us doesn't mean that I should try to do the reverse. I think the reason there are many beliefs is that there are many ways of viewing the one Thing. All organized religion is just the human way of putting a human face on things. Jesus never wrote; He was only quoted. Just like the Bible; it's the human stenography of what God might be. So whether you're Thetan Order Seven or Buddhist; Holy Roller or Hindu; Hebrew or Muslim, what we're all arguing about is which shade of blue we're looking at. agnostics wonder whether the color is blue or green; atheists just don't believe there's color. That's why I keep my mind open... including to the possibility that, despite the twisted viewpoints of folks like Pat Robertson or Pope Gregory or Ayatollah Khomeini, there's something out there. What it is, I don't know. So all we need to do is separate the hooey from the straight dope. But it ain't going to be easy.
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