By G.D. Maxwell
"God is a concept by which we measure our pain."
— John Lennon
In religious terms, a True Believer takes comfort in knowing whatever machinations of Man take place for the three score and ten they’ll be kicking around Earth, the dessert table of Life comes in the Hereafter and they’d better keep their noses as clean as possible ‘cuz St. Peter’ll have their official scorecard come the day of reckoning.
An Atheist says, "Hokum! There ain’t no God and there ain’t no Hereafter." This is not to say atheists lead depraved lives, are bad people or don’t have an intuitive grasp of the Golden Rule. They just don’t buy the hokus-pokus of religion and regardless of how good a life they’ve led will, according to the True Believers, spend eternity burning in Hell. Or at least they would have before the Pope more or less put the kibosh on Hell a few years ago.
An Agnostic, the joke goes, is an Atheist who hopes to God he’s not wrong.
The world of organized religion, spearheaded by the Roman Catholic Church, is coming to blows with Canada’s leaders. This time, inexplicably, over the mortal soul of the Right Honourable Jean Chrétien of all people. Well Big Jean and all the lesser politicians that is. All the elected representatives we sent to Parliament to run the secular government of Canada.
The flashpoint this time is homosexual marriage, husband-husband, wife-wife, partners ‘til death do us part, forsaking all others. You know the drill.
But first, the caveats. You can consider them up-front apologies if it makes you feel better or disclaimers, a writer’s waiver of liability.
I don’t really give a hang whether homosexual men and women get married. I’ve been married and I’ve lived in sin and quite frankly, I prefer sin. As long as you don’t give me any grief about it, I’ll oblige you with the same tolerance.
My only point of contention with the same-sex people is their larceny of the word ‘gay.’ It still pisses me off because it used to be one of my favourite adjectives and now I can’t even begin to describe something I’ve been to as a gay affair without raising eyebrows and/or suspicions. Most of the ‘gay’ folks I know are very kind, accepting, people. They’re enjoyable to be around and I count them as friends. But only sometimes – just like the rest of us – do they approach that rapturous state of gaiety that truly justifies the word.
And while I don’t mean to offend anyone I know who considers themselves Catholic, I’m likely to say some unkind things about some of the men who run their Church and bring up, by way of example, some of its more egregious historical travesties. But like the Bishops say when trying to explain away the wave of paedophilia accusations against priests, you gotta get right with the Lord even though some of his messengers are scalawags.
And you probably ought to know I don’t believe in heaven, don’t believe in hell, don’t believe in the mortal spirit of man and don’t believe in God. I do believe we can make our earthly experience heaven or hell in the colloquial sense and I do believe this is the only show in town – when we’re gone, we’re gone. No fire, no harps, just meat and whatever memories we leave behind with those who knew us when we were us.
Fred Henry, the Bishop of the Archdiocese of Calgary, told Big Jean he was risking his eternal salvation if he pushed the same-sex marriage bill Parliament will kick around when it reconvenes in the fall. Jean-Louis Plouffe, Ontario’s top Bishop, said much the same thing about Paul Martin. Big Jean and Paul both call themselves Catholic. Of course they both call themselves Liberals too. So much for the meaning of words.
Aloysius Ambrozic, Archbishop of Toronto, called on parish priests to speak out from the pulpit against same-sex marriage and whip their followers into a frenzy of letter-writing.
The Roman Catholic Church is seeking intervenor status with the Supreme Court to argue against the draft legislation.
And the Pope.... Well, I think we all pretty much know what PJP2’s take on this is.
In an op-ed piece in last Saturday’s Globe and Mail, Bishop Henry defended his threat to Big Jean and other Catholic politicians as free speech. No problem here. If he’d left it at that, I’d trust ‘Catholics’ to do what they’ve been doing for years – ignore the absurd rantings of their addled leaders.
The Bishop writes that Catholic politicians are duty-bound to follow the edicts of the Church when it comes to consideration of matters before them that run afoul of "...moral principles that do not admit exception, compromise or derogation...." In other words, where matters of State conflict with Church doctrine, Catholic politicians have to vote the Church line, not the party line, or risk their place in heaven.
Quite frankly, that ought to scare the hell out of any politician brave enough to admit to his religious affiliation since it means he would be unlikely to get elected in our secular society.
And while the Bishop takes great pains to stress the point that Canada has no constitutional separation of Church and State, the rest of his missive simply fuels the argument for why we need one.
Consider a society run on the model of the Catholic Church and their interpretations of the Bible. Only men get to play, women are birthin’ babies like they’re goin’ out of style and the planet’s even further overpopulated, everything’s done in secret by appointed officials, there’s a dictator for life, the sun and planets revolve around the Earth, we’re down with slavery, we’re putting out eyes left and right, men in power get to bugger little boys and other men in power will protect them, and if the heretics get too far out of hand, light the fires and have a weenie roast. Spare us.
Besides, the whole Biblical proscription against homosexuality dangles from pretty skinny threads. If Jesus was okay with lepers, prostitutes, the downtrodden and even forgave the proto-Nazis who nailed him to the cross, can you really believe he’d be so squeamish about homosexuals?
I’m not even sure a modern reading of the Bible and biblical times wouldn’t call into question which way Jesus swung. I mean, how many guys who reached their 30s in his day hadn’t taken an wife? How many hung out with 12 hand-picked guys who doted on his every word and carried his message to others. And how many guys got betrayed by a kiss from another guy?
Maybe the Church ought to just turn the other cheek on this one.
