Honest With Me

I spent some time in Barnes with Fellow Seeker, Skeptic, and Devout today. We congregated in a Fiction & Literature aisle (I believe it was in the S's) and sat on the floor with stacks of magazines. One of the magazines that I had grabbed was The Progressive. It caught my eye with the mention of an article entitled, "God Owes Us An Apology." It was written by Barbara Ehrenreich, whom you may know as the author of Nickel and Dimed. The article was very good; if you're interested you should check it out. She basically wrote that the tsunami had nothing to do with man, and that an omnipotent, all-loving God has a lot of explaining to do. I loved this quote:

"If we are responsible for our actions, as most religions insist, then God should be, too, and I would propose, post-tsunami, an immediate withdrawal of prayer and other forms of flattery directed at a supposedly moral deity--at least until an apology is issued[...]."

It's like a God boycott. What a funny concept. I apologize to those who would take offense at my finding this amusing. But imagine if people started questioning God instead of simply taking all that is handed to us. Yes, I will certainly go back to church, just as soon as You explain Yourself, Mister. Reminiscent of talking back to our parents as children. I have been under the impression that you're not allowed to talk back to God. Friends of mine (Mentor and Future Priest, for example) tell me that it's okay to be angry at God. But just how much is okay? Am I supposed to voice my dissent and then just get over it? In social relationships, that's not how it works. Telling someone that they have hurt you doesn't help you heal. The healing comes when they either (a) apologize because they had no good reason for hurting you, or (b) explain the good reason they had. God is not prepared to do either. Is He? (Goodness, it's so tiresome calling God "He" all the time.)

Now I see what my problem is. I look at God as a person - a parent, of sorts. This is why this humility stuff is so hard for me. I respect my parents, but I expect them to be fair to me. Whether I expect that because I see it as my right, or because my parents have generally behaved that way, is up for debate. However, now that I'm older, they can explain why they did or didn't do certain things, and it makes sense to me. With God, there is no such explanation in this life. I look at Him as a parent who doesn't play by the rules. You hurt me (or allowed me to be hurt) without an explanation. Tsk, tsk, God. That's not playing fair. Come to think of it, how many of us were satisfied with our parents' explanations of "Because I said so"?

Every time I start writing how I really feel, I sit here and reread it and marvel at my audacity. Not in a good way, either.