Freethinking Upstart

Nowadays, when someone says that they believe in God you have no idea what the heck they are talking about. Do they mean a higher self, like the New Agers? Do they mean the sky God waiting to zap you, like the Catholics? Do they mean the God that cares if you have ice cream after your burger, like the Orthodox Jews? Or do they mean the It that set off the big bang, never to be heard from again, like Thomas Paine? Or do they mean the laws of the Universe, like Stephen Hawking?

When atheists get all riled up about God, generally they are referring to personal God, one that answers prayers and writes books as a guide for humanity, the one most people believe in.

When atheists get riled up by New Agers it's usually because of their pseudo-scientific methods of healing, like crystals, reiki, and their ideas about psychic powers.

Why do we get upset by these things? Because they are demonstrably false. Prayer doesn't work, and God's books for humanity are a sham. "Alternative Medicine" is like "Intelligent Design," a nice word for a crock of crocodile crap. If it don't work, then it don't work. If it's bunk then it's bunk.

Moving onto the re-definers of the word God... why? I mean if God is energy, or nature, or the laws of the universe, then why used the word God? It's terribly misleading. When most people use the word God, they mean the type that writes books and answers prayers. It's like changing the word Bible to mean the metaphorical book of the best science, ethics, and philosophy currently known to man.

So anyhow, if you believe in a metaphorical higher self, or some ultimate being that started the big bang, or if you like to look at the laws of the Universe, Nature and Energy in a poetic sense, do humanity a favor; don't call it God. It only causes confusion.

Unless of course you can convince everyone else to refer to their gods by their first names. Jews refer to YHWH, Christians to Jesus, Muslims to Allah, and everyone else's mythical all powerful beings by their proper names.

Labels: religion