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By Marla Buchanan

Bill was a 23-yr.-old former IVCC student. He was a talented artist, a loving father to his two small children, and a caring friend to many who knew him. Bill "went home to be with the Lord" late last semester, according to the preacher who gave his eulogy. This funeral was the third I have attended where the pastor actively proselytized during the service. On this particular occasion, the reverend related his account of Bill’s conversion: Bill was asked "If you were to die tonight, are you sure that you would go to Heaven?" Bill replied that he was "working on it." The preacher had him pray the ‘sinner’s prayer,’ and Bill was ‘saved.’ All of this allegedly took place a few days before Bill was found dead of reputed alcohol poisoning. For someone who was ‘saved,’ he sure wasn’t taken care of properly.

This has caused me to continue to ponder the existence of God in His Judeo-Christian-Islamic sense, and His competence as a ‘father.’ If God were an earthly parent, at best He would be regarded as neglectful. What would you think of a father who did the following?  Had children so that they would be his servants. When his eldest children disobeyed him for the first time, he kicked them out and cursed them and their descendants with hardship, suffering, and death. Looked the other way as wars and persecutions were carried out in his name. Famine, pestilence, and natural disasters were met with indifference on his part. And the rape and murder of his children were met with equal disregard. If his children did not do what he said, he tortured them with fire—but he ‘loved’ them. Not exactly ‘Father of the Year’ material, is he?

As a ‘child of God,’ I have experienced the following: physical, mental, and sexual abuse as a child (a lot of which occurred after I was ‘saved’). The molestation of two precious little girls perpetrated by a fundamentalist who also nearly blinded me when he beat, and kicked me in the face. This man still walks around free, after getting a B.S. at a private university (at public expense), and U.S. citizenship (at private expense).

What are the potential repercussions of collective thinking? Churches would be forced to close their doors and become libraries, and trade schools. Collection plates nationwide would stand empty as people give directly to charities of their own choice. Holy Cadillac’s, and Lexus’s would be wholly repossessed. Haute Couturiers, and suit makers would be in a panic, as silkworms soothe there over productive assets. Pius men and women would return to the more fundamental sackcloth. Jewelers would lament as gold sales plummet. Innocents would be safe from the ‘laying on of hands.’ Churches would be forced to pay taxes and decide which side of the fence to stay on the ecclesiastical or the political. Widows and shut-ins would get to keep their Social Security checks, and dine on something grander than Friskie’s Buffet. And uterus’s everywhere would be free from the loving threats of eternal damnation and clerical dominion.