Derivations on a Theme -- Santa, God and Unicorns

Trey Smith

I have mentioned before that one of my favorite blogs is Bruce Gerencser's Fallen From Grace. Week after week he churns out candid and thought-provoking posts. In a recent entry, Hating God, Bruce writes:

For some reason Christians simply can not wrap their mind around the notion that I do not believe God exists, not just the Christian God, but ANY God. Even when point blank told this, many of them insist that there is no such thing as an atheist. In other words, no matter what I say I am, they know differently.

Since I believe God is a fiction of the human imagination (albeit a fiction that many find great comfort and hope in), it would be certifiably insane for me to hate something or someone that does not exist.

I do not spend one moment hating God. With so many real things and people to hate why would I waste my time hating a fictitious being? This would be akin to me hating the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus. You would think I was stupid and slightly off in the head if I went around spreading my hate for Santa Claus. And rightly so.

Like Bruce, I cannot recount the number of times that people have told me that, if only I would stop hating God, I would see the truth of Jesus, heaven and all the other stuff that goes with it. It is my anger with the divine that imprisons me.

And, just like Bruce, no matter how I attempt to convey to them that I'm not enraged with an entity that I don't believe exists, they simply repeat their mantra ad nauseam. Their steadfast refusal to accept whatever explanation I provide is annoying and highly irritating.

For the record, I do not hate God, the Holy Spirit, Allah, Santa Claus, unicorns, the Tooth Fairy, poltergeists, Satan, leprechauns, Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, the Easter Bunny or Fred Flintstone. I do not hate ANY of these things for the simple reason that I do not think a one of them is R-E-A-L.

I think it isn't really possible to hate something that a person believes is fictitious. There are many characters in books, plays and movies that I dislike, but hate is an intense emotion that smolders in a person's mind. How can an individual truly be incensed to the maximum degree at something no different than a paper doll (unless you live in The Twilight Zone)?

Even further, I'm not sure if there is anything these days that I hate (in the fullest sense of the word). This is not to suggest that I never get angry -- I do -- but it tends to burn itself out very quickly. I realized long ago that hate is more damaging to the person that harbors it than the person or group it's aimed at.

Hate is negative energy on steroids. It is like a volatile chemical that corrodes whatever container it is held in. It eats away at a person from the inside and, if you're not careful, it can easily leave an empty crater where the heart used to be!

Aren't there enough challenges in life as it is? Why set a ticking bomb inside yourself that can quickly implode the entire structure?

So, I really, really, really don't hate god -- your god or anyone else's. I don't even dislike him/her/it/them a smidge. The reason I neither hate nor dislike him/her/it/them is that I believe all of them are human creations that only exist in some people's minds...just not in my mind.