Maybe He's Busy Watching The Food Network Like Me

My mom sent me a text message this morning, reminding me to "Save The Date". She's graduating in June with her bachelor's degree in Bible and Theology, and wants me to attend the ceremony in Des Moines. Can you feel my excitement level skyrocket? No? That's because it didn't skyrocket, it actually dipped down below the "practically no pulse at all" level instead.

After graduation, she plans to get a "license to minister". Which...huh? I thought anybody could just...open a church and start stealing from people. Is that not how it works? Is there some kind of government regulation for curch leadership that I'm not aware of? And if so, how do they pay for the government oversight? Not with church taxes, I know that for damn sure.

Then my mom started texting about the big ice storm they had down in Arkansas this week, how it's the worst one she's seen in the 20 years she's been living there, and how they're on the third day of cancelled school (for my brother) and cancelled work (for her). She hasn't been able to accomplish anything because the power is out. Still. Even though the storm happened a couple days ago. She told me that she's praying for the electricity to come back on so they don't lose all the perishable food and so that they can take showers and flush the toilet again.

Now...see, here's where my brain takes a violent detour from any path that might promote a belief in a higher power. Because of things like this, I'm totally unable to suspend my disbelief in the supernatural for even just one minute.

Hey, mom? Don't you think maybe it would have made more sense to pray for better weather, like, three days ago? You know, since god is in charge of all that stuff (hence the comment you made about how global warming is phooey), couldn't he sort of prevent the giant, nation-wide ice storm from starting in the first place? Might he have taken it upon himself to prevent all those people from dying in car crashes and freezing to death because of the storm?

Don't you think that praying for the electricity to come back on is sort of MISSING THE BOAT so far as prayers go? I mean, god didn't give a fuck about your perishable food two days ago when he sent 3 inches of frozen death your way. What makes you think he gives a flying fuck about it today?

Also, if it turns out that I'm wrong and god is totally real and listening to you, and your prayers are answered after all, perhaps you should submit some sort of pre-prayer; a Blanket Prayer Request, if you will, that covers all future calamity and misfortune. God might need a heads up that next week you'd prefer not to lose your best friend to domestic violence or that in another 6 months, you'd really rather not lose one of your students to leukemia.

It's really only fair. God's no fucking mind reader. Wait...