I didn't mind you stopping me in the snow, while I listened to Hank Williams sing the blues. You three with your black wool coats and bright colored gloves, holy book in hand. You were impossibly nice and earnest, and you asked what I thought in such a way that I had no answer -- they were leading questions about men and God and no, what you said doesn't mean a thing to me, but I just said I didn't know.
I didn't mind, because while you tried to make something click in my head or soul, while you talked about Joseph Smith and holy lights, and how even good heathens get to the lower levels of heaven, I tried to look in your eyes and figure you out. How'd you get this sincerity and certainty that you have the truth?
Maybe I should have told the truth. I'll look at your pamphlet, sure. I once read a whole book for heathens by Christians -- then I threw it on the floor, because it answered nothing.
I'm not saying there's no God or heaven... It's just you always insult the work of man, and sure we're incomplete. We got issues. But --
If you want moments of clarity, see me reading "Nirvana" by Charles Bukowski in a Borders and almost crying because poetry could be like that.
If you want bravery, check out Christopher Hitchens, so sure that there's nothing after death, but knowing he'll go out with his head up. And if there's a God, Hitchens will be right there giving him a few cross words.
If you want self-sacrifice, how about Raoul Wallenberg's life for 100,000 strangers?
If you want loving your fellow man, how about men being told for months to hate the other, then shaking hands on Christmas and burying their dead?
And if you must have religion, if you must have religion, why not the crowd singing the chorus of "I Hear Them All" on New Years Eve? Sure felt like religion to me.
Come on, it was even in church.
That's what means something. That's a God and a heaven, no matter if there's a God and a heaven, too.
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