OK, so we know the AJC caters to the lowest common denominator on things like this. They cut out reviews of the Atlanta Symphony concerts; and when I complained they said they just didn't have enough readers who were interested to justify the space. For one small review of about 30 concerts a year? Less than one a week. No space available? They have a whole section on sports every day. So much for being a proactive community resource that tries to raise the level of culture in Atlanta.
Ms. Murray writes for the 12 year old level of moral maturity -- to be fair, she occasionally is a bit more advanced than that, but not much and not often. She sticks pretty close to fundamentalist Biblical teaching, and she writes a lot about praying. Her concept of God seems to be an inscrutable, authoritarian father who decides capriciously whether to answer your prayers -- but you need to just keep right on praying anyway.
I grew up immersed in the same atmosphere, but in high school I started thinking on a different level, and through the years I have increasingly felt irritated by that childlike combination of compelled supplication and obedient passivity. At the same time, I still respect what faith and prayer may mean in an individual's life, without believing it myself literally -- so long as others don't try to force their beliefs and practice on me.
Ms. Murray's God is all-knowing, all-wise, and has a greater plan for our lives than we can understand. Just as the religion of my childhood had no answer for my questions of why, if God was all-powerful, he was so capricious in letting bad things happen to good people, even when they prayed diligently according to instructions. Why did God let the corrupt man prosper in good health and let the innocent child die of cancer, even though a whole church-load of people were praying for her to be saved?
You have to pray, really really hard -- and then God may seem to favor the one who didn't pray at all. Yet even then you aren't supposed to question God, just keep on praying harder. The stock answer I received, and rejected, at age 17: "We just aren't meant to understand everything." That about covers it, I guess -- except that it doesn't answer anything at all.
OK. So that's the definition of faith: the belief in that which cannot be seen or proved or understood.
So, back to Lorraine Murray's column and Superbowl Sunday. This question of God's capriciousness (Murray would likely say his inscrutable wisdom) reaches its silliest expression when rival teams both pray to win the same game. Ms. M. brings up Tim Tebow (whose team won't be playing today in the Superbowl). He has made headlines for kneeling in prayer on the field just before an important play. And then several times, he made some remarkable play. Hoo-Hah. Didn't the prayer people eat that one up !! But then, what about the time he knelt and prayed before a whole stadium full of people -- and then he didn't win the game?
By the way: Didn't Jesus say something derisive about the Pharisees who make a big show of praying in public? And he advised instead to "go into your closet and pray in secret to God who hears you in secret"? Yes, he did. Lorraine Murray's Bible says so.
Ms. M.'s column reached its usual heights of inanity yesterday. In all seriousness, she writes:
"Does God care about the Super Bowl? Well, he sees the sparrow fall, so why wouldn't he watch the football flying across the field? On Super Bowl Sunday I'm guessing that players on both sides will be praying silently to win -- and I trust the Lord will be well aware of this."
[Intrusive thought: Does God watch the game on TV, or can he just see it with divine vision?]ARRRGHHHHH !!! So which team will God favor? All she had to offer on this question was this lame conclusion: "God hears all our prayers, but sometimes he says no."
Right. We aren't meant to understand everything.
Gee, thanks, ma'am. I guess that justifies your four-column space each week for your little sermonette -- taking up room that could have been devoted to a review of our world class orchestra and chorus, which just gave the best performance of Mahler's 2nd symphony I have ever heard. The Atlanta Symphony Chorus is celebrated by musicians and critics in New York and Berlin when they have sung there, and the newspapers there review them, very favorably I might add. But the Atlanta paper had no space to let the people of Atlanta know about this magnificent performance by this home-town treasure -- and instead let Ms. Murray dither on about God and the Super Bowl.
Bah ! Humbug !!
Ralph
So, why do I keep reading her column?
ReplyDeleteGood question. I think it's like the sore that you keep poking to see if it still hurts. It does.
I obviously still have scars from a religion that terrified impressionable young children with threats of hellfire. And then there was the story of Abraham and Isaac, where God told Abraham to kill his son Isaac and burn his body on the altar as a sacrifice to God. (Yes, this is the Old Testament, not Jesus' parables. But it's still a Bible Story the Methodists love to tell.
The supposed point of the story, mind you, is that Abraham was a God-fearing man and would have killed his son to obey God -- BUT that God was so merciful that, having tested Abraham's obedience, he then forbade him to do it and to sacrifice a lamb instead.
God's mercy is not the take-home message children get though. To my young ears, God sounded downright Dangerous and maybe even Deranged. What if he pulled that stunt with MY father? What would my father do?
Let's call it what it is -- Child Abuse -- to tell such terrifying stories to young children.
So, Ms. Murray, I do not appreciate your brand of religion and I strenuously object to the AJC letting such drive take up space, week after week. They could at least present other points of view. Why not rotate a column and have people of different faiths write a column on a topic like this. And please include a Unitarian and -- let's really be daring -- a secular humanist.
Dear Ralph,
ReplyDeleteIt seems you have little understanding of the Catholic religion. For Catholics, the single most important thing is the salvaion of our souls.
"For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?" (Matthew 16:26)
Therefore, God would take this important truth into consideration when deciding which team to aid in the Super Bowl - since winning or losing may have an impact on one's salvation. Furthermore, your statement "God may seem to favor the one who didn't pray at all" is moot since you have no way of knowing who God favors.
As for the existence of hellfire, I think the world would be a much better place if people, especially our leaders, believed in its reality. The doctrine of hell was not the problem in the past, but rather the way spiritually immature people used it to control their children. Spiritually immature people of all faiths have always existed, and will find some creative way to mess up their children.
Stop blaming Catholicism itself.
Stephen
Dear Stephen,
ReplyDeleteThanks you for comment. I'm sure there is much I do not understand about catholicism, but perhaps more than you assume. The salvation of our souls was also the most important thing in my fundamentalist Methodist upbringing. I understand what kind of priorities that puts on lives -- or should for those who believe it.
It's not so much that I don't understand that as it is that I no longer have that point of view, because I don't view God and our souls in the same way.
I do certainly agree that it matters how it's all presented to children and that no religion has a monopoly on best and worst teachers or on those who terrify children.