God is not dead but alive and well and working on a much less ambitious project. -Anonymous, Graffito

I used to be fairly religious. Superficially, at least, I thought there was a God, that the the Bible was mostly true and that my confirmation meant something. I participated in my confirmation class discussions, I gave homilies at the student services. I enjoyed church.

I don't know what happened. I think this probably lasted three years, at the most. I hid it well I think, though not on purpose. I was perfectly content with it, I was private about it. I didn't force it on anyone, I didn't wear cross necklaces. I think at the most I was only mildly religous, but I still don't know what happened. One day, I thought that everyone probably made their own religion out of institutionalized ones, that every Christian was a little different. Some time passes and now I think there may be a higher being, maybe.

Here's my problem: I don't know that God, the higher power, the Creator or whatever you wish to call him, really cares about how we worship him, unless that is the sole purpose for which we were created. And if that is the case, then this is a rather vain and selfish god who I do not think deserves my worship whether he created me or not. And if we were created for some other purpose, if there is some other reason why we exist and why we have this island, ocean blue planet and all we're worrying about is the specific ritual details about how we worship, then we are probably doing something wrong.

If God only gave us pleasure to tempt us, I am quite content with giving in. That is just cruel and sadistic. Perhaps, by being so concerned with what not to do, we might be missing the point. Maybe, if there is a higher power, the test is one that we are most desperately failing. How to live harmoniously, how to be happy, how live and let live...

I sound like a tree-hugging, hemp wearing hippie. All I'm trying to say is that perhaps if we were less concerned with living by specific rituals, deadlocked rules and commandments given to us by an incomprehensible God, and more concerned with living with basic human rules, rules we can all understand, we'd be happier. And if whatever created us has a problem with that, then we rebel. There are more of us than there are of him anyway. We can totally take him.

You might want to stand back... I think there is a lightning bolt in my future.