If you had faith...

As most of you know, I am can be an unapologetic, raving rationalist.  It's a good life.  I'm not complaining.

I would, however, like to address the religious fundamentalists among my readers -- if, in fact, you could find a religious fundamentalist among my readers.

I invite the religious fundamentalists among my readers to have more faith.

I say this because I think that you believe we are all subject to God.  All of us.  That our destiny is pretermined and that no one can fight the will of God.  Awesome.  So, if that is true, maybe you should rest easy.  Eventually, all us crazy rationalists, and scientists, and thinkers will have to accept the resounding, unassailable truth that there is a God.  Eventually, we will acquire enough knowledge that we will know the face of God and we will bow down before him.  Ok.

But until that day, you can't beat it into me.  Until that day, you can't shame it into me, or deny it into me, or ostracize it into me, bomb it into me, starve it into me, rape it into me.  All these things:  violence, shame, degradation, in your parlance, are these not the tools of the devil?

Perhaps I, and people like me, have been put on this earth by God to test not us, but you.  Perhaps, if you had more faith, you would not fall to such base behaviours.  Have faith.  Be your best, greatest, most Godly self.  For your sake and the sake of all others.

Whoever happens to be 'right' (and you might be surprised to learn that I don't give a toss who is right or who is wrong), we all will have a more civilized, decent path to that knowledge.  It would be a good thing, a Godly thing.