SEARCHING FOR GOD IN ALL THE WRONG PLACES

Even a cursory reading of some of my journals and newsweeklies makes it quite evident that atheism is finding a resurgence these days. Not that atheism was ever dead, mind you. It’s always been around on the fringes even in my lifetime. The old Russian cosmonauts were widely quoted as saying they found no evidence of God in outer space and Madalyn Murray O'Hair gained much newsprint and perhaps even a living trying to take God and prayer out of schools.

Today writers and social critics like Christopher Hitchens, author of God is Not Great: Why Religion Poisons Everything, and The God Delusion by Oxford evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, hit the best-seller list, command media attention and even interest sort-of retired clergy. Hitchens condemns religion as "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive of children.”

Religion can be that, often is that, even Christianity. But religion is of-man, of-human beings. It is not necessarily of-God. That is not to say that one cannot find God in religion. It is to say that some religious practices can be anything but Godly. We creatures of God, children of God, often do some of the ungodliest things in the name of God and religion. It’s no wonder religion has often gotten a bad rep and God has gotten the raw end of the deal.

The problem with atheists is that they are constantly searching for God in all the wrong places. Granted, they should find God where they, all too often, have not: in organized religion, in institutions and structures. But God is only peripherally found therein. God is found in creation, first and foremost, and in God’s creatures most certainly. The fact that we creatures of God, we children of God, often do not reflect God in our own lives in not God’s fault. It is ours.

Violent behavior, racism, bigotry and the like are not and never were of God. The fact that they exist is not proof that God does not. They are proof that many of us who profess a belief in God are not living as God would have us live. That’s our fault, not God’s. I can’t blame my parents for my sinfulness or shortcomings. They wouldn’t approve any more than God does; but that does not negate them as people any more than it should or would negate God.

Free will is the real issue at hand, is it not? Hitchens and Dawkins have the free will and the freedom to believe what they so choose to believe and even condemn those who believe otherwise. But they can do so because the God who created them allows them that freedom even though, in my opinion, that same God wishes they would not.

All they, or any one else for that matter, have to do to know God exists is to observe the faith of those who are being persecuted because of their faith or skin color or for any other reason, watch those who not only walk the extra mile but walk the first one, who give not from their excess but from their necessities. That’s where they will find God.

No Regrets

In her latest novel, Home, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Marilynne Robinson tells the story of two siblings who come back home to Gilead to spend some time with their aged and dying father, a retired pastor. Gloria, who is single, is a teacher who gives up her career to tend to her father because, it seems, none of her seven siblings is willing to help share the duty and, in all honesty, the burden.

Jack, the black sheep of the family, returns home unexpectedly, seemingly from out of nowhere because everyone in the family has lost track of Jack and Jack has done nothing to keep in touch. Throughout the course of the novel Robinson has Jack and Gloria reflect on what was and what might have been had they each taken different roads. It is a fascinating read and further evidence of Robinson’s skills as a writer.

During one of their conversations Jack says to Gloria, “There’s a lot I could regret….If there was any point to it.” And isn’t that the truth? The further truth is that we are all like Jack to one degree or another. We have all done things over the years that we now regret, said words that we wish we had not, not taken roads we could have and taken others we should have avoided like the plague.

We all have regrets, loads of them. Yet, as Jack opines, what’s the use in spending time regretting the mistakes we have made over the years? We cannot go back and undo what we did, reverse our course and then take the roads that would have been best for us. Life, our life has moved on. Regretting the past only keeps us riveted in the past so much so that it is difficult to live in the present.

Whenever we reflect on the past, what we are to do is learn from the past, both from the good and the bad. Regret for mistakes made and roads not taken should not be part of the reflection for, as Jack says, there is no point to it other than to replay the guilt feelings we had already put to rest as life forced us to move on, knowing that in order to live in the present, we have to let go of the past.

But we do, don’t we? We often allow regret for things done and left undone to hold us back from moving on with life. Sometimes we can become so overcome with remorse or guilt that we cease living and simply vegetate our way through the present. It is only when we come to our senses and realize that if no one else understands us and no one else forgives us for our mistakes, at least God does. And that should be enough for us to forgive ourselves. Jack, for all his waywardness, understood that.

Not only do we often allow regret to bog us down before we move on with our lives, we often demand that others show a modicum of regret for their past sinful, selfish or foolish actions before we will allow them to move on with their lives. In the process no one moves ahead.

The past is passed. It is what it was. We have learned from it. What is now and what will be is our only concern. No regrets.