A word on discrimination

Discrimination is real. It goes beyond race, gender, sexuality, or any one particular thing. To discriminate means to recognize a distinction or difference. It is frequently evil when used to exclude or injure people based on their personal characteristics. It is often good when used to carefully choose which thoughts one wishes to verbally articulate. […]

I feel like Job

I haven’t lost my family, health, or wealth, Maybe because my family imploded before it started, my health was never fully mine (hi, depression), and I never had any wealth to speak of as far as my culture is concerned. God, it’s REALLY hard to like You right now. It doesn’t look like You like […]

Thirty-one

In younger days through melancholy haze I’d write sorrowful songs to music I couldn’t play about feelings that didn’t stay and a life that didn’t belong in the dreams of my world, nor the screams when I curled around my knees deep in the night. I wouldn’t fight; I couldn’t fight. So demons I made […]

Psalm 151

God, I’m angry with You. I know You don’t deserve it, but I still am because it feels like You do. My life doesn’t go the way I think it should. As much as I can look back and see how You’ve guided me in the past, I still can’t see clearly where you’re leading […]

Why should I care? Apathy and exploitation – ending our civil religion, Part III

A good friend called me out for assuming too much, and he was right. One of my worst tendencies is to become passionate about an issue and begin discussing it with others without fully appreciating that they have not been inside my head to follow all the steps I’ve taken to get to where I […]

Tyranny of the “Gospel of Freedom” – ending our civil religion, Part II

What does it mean to worship? The root of the word “worship” is “worth,” so the most basic meaning of worship is to ascribe worth to something. We all think some ideal, some person, or some thing has a kind of ultimate worth, and in a variety of different ways we demonstrate our opinions regarding […]

Death to the idea of “Christian America” – ending our civil religion, Part I

There is a thing in all cultures known as a civil religion, and this does not refer to Christianity or any particular “organized” religion. It is the collective beliefs that a particular culture disseminates, and it typically borrows heavily from organized religions. Defining what, exactly, the breadth of American civil religious belief covers is a […]