Ever notice how, when something wonderful happens in your life, a super-religious human being will say something like, “See? God loves you!”

How come when something rotten happens, they never say, “See? God hates your guts”?

I was on the street one day recently when I heard one of these folks proclaiming the goodness of God because it was a bright and sunny day.  Where was he, and He, when Katrina hit?

These are the same people who proclaim that they live and breathe by the Bible, and that is why they condemn homosexuality. Yet they eat pork and go shopping on Sundays – two things that God expressly forbids in the Bible. (Look it up. It’s there. “Thou shalt not go WalMart-ing on the Sabbath.” Seriously!)

As they condemn non-believers as pagans who are destined for Hell, they applaud Christ’s sermons that deal with inclusiveness.

As they inform gays that they are sinning, they look the other way with the greedy CEO’s on Wall Street who rake in millions of bucks with shady business deals.

They claim that the Bible is not a bunch of allegorical stories which are meant to teach lessons. Instead, they say that the Bible is pure fact and should be accepted as the unfaltering Word of God. If that is true, tell me where Cain and Abel’s wives came from. 

According to Genesis, there were only two human beings on the planet before Cain and Abel, and those two were Adam and Eve. However, the Bible says that when the two bros were old enough, they ventured away to far-off lands, and when they returned, they had wives.

Where did these women come from? Did somebody pull off another Creation in the next county, and not tell us about it?

Also, if the Bible is steadfast, bedrock truth, do these folks actually believe that there is firmament over the flat earth, and that this firmament has holes in it to let the rain through, and that these holes are evidenced in the eveningsby the pinpricks of light, which we call stars?

To my mind, you can’t have it both ways. The Bible is either fact, or it isn’t. You can’t pick and choose which parts are fact and which parts are fiction, particularly if you are using selected “facts” to condemn others.

Am I a believer? Sometimes. I struggle with faith, but I think, when push comes to shove, that I actually do believe in a Supreme Being and an afterlife of some sort or another.

Do I believe that the Bible is pure fact? Nope. There are way too many inconsistencies for me to claim that.

And yet some folks will judge and condemn others (“Judge not lest you shall be judged.”) who happen to disagree with them, and use this Good Book as proof that God is on their side.

Sorry. I don’t buy it.