Patience

Best I leave Religion to the religious

Its intriguing don't you think, the way Religion reveals every aspect of us, (if we care to take notice) no matter what our outward demeanour it sheds fragments of being revealing a personal seal one cannot escape. Such a nerve hitting topic isn't it - our faith. There's no doubt it's important to us, and we are very precious about it - so much precious indignation wasted on scoring petty points , so much energy expelled in the heated and venomous defence of its righteousness; (usually arising when one has a need to justify a not so charitable characteristic of their faith) and I cant help but question (as I do ) when I witness such defence - how can one profess truth in their belief, when one has no peace in its truth.?

History confirms the ancients created an assortment of Gods to accommodate mans benevolent and evil tendencies. Statues of stone and wood, countless paintings and haunting etchings in exquisite detail, glorify the love and wrath of the Divine and, emancipate unfathomable Evil. They leave us in no doubt of what to expect in the realms of heaven and hell. I would venture to say, the book of Revelations is the most scrutinized book of the holy scripts; was it really realized through profound revelation or an acid trip? - who knows. Who cares? - the majority of us I would think, fear was its intent and what could possibly be more fearful than fear itself? Alas we, the supposedly highly evolved ( as opposed to the beasts and birds of our world) can't seem to do without the threat of eternal damnation or the lure of some form of heaven after death to encourage us to be virtuous - and we still suck at it.

Eventually we came up with a more cultured religion and rejected the ancients idolization of so many gods deeming all things notable to be under the cover of one God, but we still couldn't agree on the list of terms and conditions so we split the Divine entity and distinguished our God elect, by different names. And don't we love to parade our self righteousness and the virtue of our one true God, and in our Gods name we substantiate our mean covetous spirit, with God on our side we can justify anything - the slaughter of innocence, nation overtaking nation , genocide, disdain, prejudice, displacement, persecution - the list is endless all in the name of our God and always for the greater good. Thank God for God, who else but an invincible Divine Entity would accept such cunning shift of accountability without objection.

Throughout the ages our Religious Leaders sacred policies and manner of conduct have been as honourable as they have been shameful and we probably wouldn't have felt the need to question the credibility of their Divine source, save for our ancestors propensity to human sacrifice, heretic burnings, poverty and suppression of the common folk under the predominant religious rulers. But question we did - and the beat goes on because the basis of Religions spirituality lies in the claim its philosophy comes from a celestial entity; written by man as given to man by the Divine. But when all is said and done the intrinsic essence of us will prevail; all manner of writings and accounts are subjective; tainted or cleansed by a human experience, nothing is exempt from our inclinations, so too our holy scripts are ever open to distorted interpretations and personal agenda's. What we feed the most is what we pass on.

I am past wondering how I will fair in the heaven and hell stakes, just being has a way of getting up front and personal, right in my face. So (it says) - how did that feel - perhaps you should take notice lest you do it again.? I don't think I need to wait until I die to discover whether I made it to heaven or hell.

Having been born into a free to choose, civilized Christian faith, and exposed to the genteel side to God; as a youngster I had from time to time been inquisitive to wander into the scattering of Churches of various faiths in my area, by wander into, I mean after the Sunday Service when the Church was empty. I was drawn to their doll house like stone structure , cathedral ceilings, stain glass windows, and sacred statues. Sometimes I would hold my breath and stare transfixed waiting for them to move (and I used to think my dolls came alive whilst I was sleeping too). In my adolescent years I attended church because it was the thing one did on a Sunday and later in my early adulthood it was what was required of me (not withstanding the mandatory conversion to the faith) because that's where I picked up the little white envelope with my name on it each Sunday, and returned it the next- filled. A small concession in order for my child to be accepted into its private school.

And so I attended worship dutifully; seemingly attentive I sat through a succession of bending knee, genuflection, unburdening my purse of loose change, partaking of the symbolic blood and body, confession of uncharitable thoughts towards my mother in law, ( a repeat offender ) and participating in its rites by chanting a response to a predetermined answer. Nothing more was required of me and I left in my Sunday best feeling less stained by my humanity and more charitable toward fellow man, ( with the exception of mother-in-law - she was another species) There were rare occasions though, when the church was void of its people, that I entered its sanctuary in truth , seeking serenity and something else I cant explain - I never left disappointed.

There are so many places of worship to choose from these days, all manner of faith are sprouting from the splinters of another’s belief ; every time you blink there’s a new house of God on the block. A new wave of up beat worship is becoming quite popular and I just happen to have an occasion (some time ago now) to attend one of these places of worship over a short period of time. I am not disposed to be very charitable about this particular institution and its leaders, to excuse their behaviour in this enlightened age deludes me, nor do I excuse my lack of grace in this instance to keep it to myself. Okay, so it was probably not that big a deal, but this house of God seriously hit my nerve, big time, and the truth of the matter is I'm not over it - yet - as this following account will attest to how so not over it I am.

Now, I don't have a problem giving a portion of my pay to maintain the Vicar, Pastor or Priest for doing a difficult and sensitive job - or to improve the Church. At first when I attended this place of worship I found it rather confronting in its theatrical mannerisms but no big deal I could get around that. What did get my attention was when I heard the preacher say to its congregation God expected his ten percent to be calculated before tax. - well didn't that get my knickers in a knot. Yes I could afford it, that wasn't the point. Its utterance stirred a suspicious and indignant side of me, impelling me to do a mental audit on the premises to justify why they were asking for more money. Perhaps we could have done without the huge new centre stage with its transformer like qualities - the convenience to flip or rotate in order to preach or purge wouldn't have been top of my list of necessities. And I had to trust the extra digging deeper into our pockets wasn't related to some being unable to find a holy means of tax evasion to pay for the newly acquired double storey mortgage. No matter which service I attended ( 4 a day) it always contained readings of certain passages from the bible relating to the principle of tithing ; and I was easy to pick up on when the congregation was slacking off on the desired quota because the occasional guest speaker would be called in to help bring home the bacon.. Not withstanding his slice of the rind from the congregations purse, the congregation was asked to put out for three offerings on those nights. One particular night is firmly etched to memory; a guest speaker relayed an astonishing account - he would have us believe he was just hanging around waiting for a plane when he was miraculously handed the keys to a yacht, (or was it the private plane) he'd prayed so hard for; to do Gods work of course. A complete stranger walked up to him and on Gods instruction was told to hand him the keys to his rather expensive possession and he did. (Now that's what I call one mother of a leap of faith on the strangers part; perhaps he should have been preaching that night).

"Go on test the Lord " ; the guest speaker said. See what happens when you are diligent in giving your tithe, push the realms of affordability, give more than required and see how God will reward you. He finished with a blustering, halleluiah praise the Lord , whilst flicking the pages of his bible to find the passage that would make its holy mark - the lone woman who gave only one coin, (as apposed to the fat cats that had the means to give more) and God saw her giving as more righteous because she gave all she had

It was just as well I preferred to sit at the back of the Church because if looks could kill - this man would have known I was in the process of ripping his tongue out. What a shameful example in the spiritual principle of giving (I thought) , what a performance and cunning manipulation on his account, and his triumph in the final means he sort to get more from less - boarded an act of extortion to my mind.

And then came a day this particular place of worship (in their divine wisdom,) found an occasion to hand a petition to its parishioners, its intent was for the congregation to sign a collective agreement that would refuse entry of Gays into the church. Firstly the ludicrous suggestion they thought they could manage to detect these so called undesirables was comical. You should not be surprised I dared to ask , through gritted teeth, please explain. Quite frankly I was curious as to how they would justify their stance. Well, I was gobsmacked, apart from the obligatory "homosexuality is a sin" the prestigious leaders considered the entry of Gays into the sanctuary of their place of worship, to be detrimental, because their (Gay) spirit would taint the spirit of the whole Church. Was I suppose to understand that?. Was I suppose to envisage an orgy could ensue by their presence, or perhaps the scary prospect of being led into hymn by the Village People. I jest of course, in fact I wasn't flippant about their stance at that time at all, I was very concerned and extremely indignant. Yet I absorbed the justification in silence, further objection on my part was futile as they considered their stance righteous, and I was promptly put out of my ignorant misery by being told (as if to sanction their cause) this principle was the same reason why God told the 'Chosen People' to kill every man ,woman, child and beast in the promised land. Ah huh - it all makes perfect sense now doesn't it....

How typical that those who consider themselves worthy to deduce what constitutes a sin, always seem to leave unmitigated hypocrisy off their list.

My indiscreet refusal to sign was not taken well which should have prompted me to keep my mouth shut - alas the pandemic of the human ego takes too much pleasure in giving a piece of its mind. Needless to say this religion and I were not taking to each other very well , I questioned their practices and principles much too often. Having the audacity to challenge gods word; as it was put; (and by extension the churches doctrine) had its consequences. The point of offence was particularly felt by a man of considerable standing in this church, prompting him to denounce me as being in possession of a rebellious and Jezebel spirit. He had a right to his opinion, his mistake was in the assumption his opinion mattered to me. This man was considered by his piers to possess a gift in the discerning of spirits; in particular the presence of the demonic and he believed he had the power to sense and purge the same from me. Optimistic of him to say the least as to date I hadn't quite assumed the position of EWE and his stance only served to make me even more determined to hold my position of devilish resistance. I do not wonder why this man was so intent on my demise, but I'll take my cheap shot in my thoughts of him when I quote in part from Shakespeare and Christ; the Preacher doth protest too much - physician heal thyself. I confess I took some (okay maybe a lot) of smug pleasure in his inability to bring me to contrition, apart from that I wasn't quite convinced I was that dangerous and so, in order to find the truth of me, I left the proverbial herd to once again sort the bleeding obvious out for myself, within myself. And we all lived happily thereafter.

Is it convenient for me to reject the church, - is it easier to believe only in the nice bits to God? Absolutely !

It is most certainly convenient; I'm all for convenience - seeking the God within me keeps it simple,

my demon, my angel, my problem. - simple. I believe we have a responsibility to question that which causes pain to others in its obvious and subtle forms, and for that matter that which disturbs our spirit and in this case I was very disturbed, (you may take that any way you wish) . To challenge this particular religions conviction was merely an expression of my right to give consideration to what I am being lead to believe is absolute, I accept some may have a problem with that. It should not surprise you that I remain a rebel and will continue to hold a position of resistance when I sense obedience is more important than the message. If I am seen to display a hint of arrogance in the process; so be it - I promise it won't hurt you.