I recently wrote a letter to a friend who I still call a friend, but have spoken to so little in the last few years that-- how is he different from anybody else now, be they the really nice homeless person or the slightly less nice person who I used to talk to with my wife at coffee, who we are unsure has a home, but he says he does. He had a boat, but says it sank. He says he owns a doctor's office, and is very fond of children, but we don't know if he even has a home. We don't know if he sleeps at night underneath the tugboat company that sits out over the water of the Baltimore inner harbor because he hates his devout, Protestant wife, like he says, or if there is another reason-- something more sad. In the middle of the letter, I talk about religion:
My sense of spirituality only goes so far as what I know to be absolutely true. I do not know that the Bible or the Koran, or the Torah or the Tibetan Book of the Dead, or the Harry Potter novels are fact or fiction, whether we are watched by ghosts or by Greek Gods or by Jesus or by the god of the old testament. There are plenty of people who would love for me to believe one of these things, or one of the thousands of other things. They want me to because they are concerned about my soul, and worry about how shitty it’s gonna be for me in hell after I die. I don’t even know how many of these people are right. How the hell would I know? Everybody has proof, and everybody refutes everybody else’s.
What I do know is that I was born who I am. I could have been African, born into a tribe at war with other tribes, convinced that this was right. I would believe in the indigenous religion I was taught. Perhaps some missionaries: Mormon or Protestant most likely: would come and convert me. Then I would believe that my family was in danger of going to hell, for holding onto their religion and not accepting Jesus or Joseph Smith or whoever. My parents would be ashamed of me, for not holding onto the one true faith.
But I was born Orthodox Christian. I left the church when I was 18, and am silently rebuked by the world I came from for letting myself be dragged away by demonic powers (I am sure my wife is blamed by many). I do not condemn religion. I do not think there is anything wrong with religion. Go ahead, it might make you a better person and give you a good life and explain your world and make you happy and convince you to help others. I do think that there is something wrong with nearly every religion though. Because somewhere in the massive list of details, there are almost always condemnations, there are almost always hurtful and derisive rules. No mother should think their son is going to hell for being a homosexual. No Catholic homosexual should feel like they might as well become a priest because they’re never going to know a happy marriage. No Catholic should ever feel devastated when their Protestant or Muslim friend dies because they’re going to hell for sure. Nobody should ever be afraid to talk to another person, to marry another person, to befriend another person, to listen (really listen) to another person, allow that person to sway them in their foundation, or to question their reality and their own religion. Everybody told me they were right. Everybody told me they had proof. The only logical conclusion I could come to was: there’s no way this really matters. I don’t believe in a god who thinks special words and special moves and special ropes and special food are our only salvation, or even a part of our salvation at all. I think god is better than that. My god is smarter than your god.
Note: I didn't tell my friend that I thought my god was smarter than his god. I thought it fit in the Blog format.
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