The God Paradox

Take a look at the number of religions. All of them claim to be correct. Most of them are mutually exclusive. Herein lies a paradox: if there are all different religions, each claiming something a little bit different from the other, how can they all be right? Which is the true religion? Who knows the truth? Does anybody? Are we all blind, shuffling around in mosques, churches, and temples, or is someone going to practice what he or she preaches? Who has God on their side?


More importantly, religion itself must be addressed for what it is. This does not apply solely to Christianity or Islam. It is all-encompassing for religions as a whole. They are fatally flawed. What is their common flaw? Well, actually, their flaw is more physical and closer than you think-- it's you. Humans are the creators and ultimately the destroyers of religion. In order to address what I am sure will be some of your first questions after reading the initial paragraph, let us examine the origins of all religion.


All religions, whether you like it or not, started for the very simple purpose of explaining life's questions that we hadn't figured out yet. Why are we here? What happens when we die? Are we special? These are questions we ask ourselves all the time. We don't know the answer to these questions... yet. How about wind? Can you explain wind? Yes, of course you can. There's even a webpage to explain it for us. But what if I told you that is was just as important and unexplained as the questions mentioned just a few sentences ago? What about fire? Lightning? Oceans? The Moon? The Sun? The way Earth moves through space? These are all undisputed answers to questions that baffled humans just two thousand years ago. Look at how long it took us to answer half of these questions. These are questions of the same level of the modern philosophical ones and yet, we view them as pithy. So have you seen where I am headed with this? Religion answers questions. We created religion to create answers. Turns out science had something to say about religion's answers to why wind blows and water falls from the sky. So who's to say that history's time-honored tradition of patterns won't continue? Why can't science simply do to modern day questions what it did to the questions of yesteryear? The answer to that question is something neither science nor religion will answer.



Religion is not an evil thing. I'm not going to say it is. Religion was a naturally devised method for explaining things, but let's face it: science is and has made serious headway where religion's version of science fell out. Take the order of the galaxy. Do I have to spell it out? Take a good look at a model of our solar system and compare it to one of the Catholic Church's in about the 15th century. Notice a different object in the center? Do you remember how the Church responded? Just because we don't know any better doesn't mean we should stick our heads in the sand and not move forward. We must shed the weight of untruths of religions. Now don't get me wrong; I am not calling for the destruction of religion. I'm merely saying that the statements there are imprecise. What do I want to keep? The most important part: the one all of you will defend. The part that all of you will use as an excuse for justifying belonging to your religion: morals. I believe that the morals that Jesus taught were right. People should show compassion and love for one another. It is essential for the survival of this species. Religion added the aforementioned untruths to gain credibility. Well, I'm sorry, but the reason I don't subscribe to any one particular religion is because of these untruths. I'm fine with worshiping without them. In fact, I relish the fact that we can teach morals to our children in a friendly atmosphere, but I refuse to raise my children in an atmosphere where they will be taught, in addition to morals, that the Earth was just willed by an omnipotent being when the science behind planet-building is quite solid. What of life, you say? I don't pretend to know how life started. But that's more than I can say for the Bible, and truth be told, aside from its morals, it's been pretty much wrong on every superstition. I'd rather hold judgment on the origins of life until science can provide me with a satisfying answer. And it will. It took thousands of years for us to learn how wind, fire, the oceans, lightning, the Moon, and the Sun worked, and who's to say it won't take that long from now to learn how life started? All I'm saying is that I refuse to accept a story that, while its morals are rightly placed, has miscalculated science.



So what about gods? Furthermore, what about this one god, popularly titled "God". It seems that these days, whatever you say will contradict what at least one other person believes, so when you believe and proclaim to a room of other like-minded people that Jesus Christ or some other prophet is the Messiah and that no other alternative exists, don't you think you're going to contradict someone else, just as entitled to their opinion as you? Aren't they, since they are equal to you, just as entitled to contradict you and name another? Who is right? Are you so sure you're right when the other guy is so sure of his own beliefs? God forbid, what if his religion states that if you aren't a part of it and that you'll burn in some dark and fiery place for eternity? Is he wrong? Herein lies why I think that there is no God, let alone any gods. Someone has to be wrong, and yet, we're all correct. Are you so convinced and conceited that you'll say that they're wrong? Step right up; try and knock this God Paradox out of the park, but be warned: you'll be meeting your newly-damned adversary again in a dark fiery place as soon as you do due to your own convictions.



Load your quivers and prepare to shoot holes through my post by commenting. I'll try and respond as much as I can. Thank you for understanding.


- Jonathan