New Year's ponderings and ramblings

Hello y'all.  Good to see you back here again.

The other day I was talking to a woman that I have known for years.  We were talking about God and faith and all the trappings that go with it.  When I said that I am trying to become better than I am now, she made a statement that disturbed me.  It still disturbs me.  She said, "Get ready to loose some friends" when I told her that I was going to go back to Church.

Now I would like to say that she is wrong in that statement.  But I wonder if she is.  You see, I have "friends" that believe in many different religions.  Buddhist.  Pagans.  Christians.  Agnostics.  Atheist.  And quite a few that don't know what they believe or even if they believe at all.

I would like to think that all of those people would continue to think of me as a friend even if I do become a Christian.  I would like to think that they wouldn't turn their backs on me because of my beliefs.  But I'm a rational person and I know that some of them, maybe a lot of them, will.  I know that some of them will question my decision and be demanding as to why.  I know some of them will just slip away into the Great Unknown never to be heard of again.  And it makes me sad.

Many of my Pagan friends are "in the closet" as they say.  That means that the people around them don't know what they believe in, or at least they aren't open about what they believe in.  I understand why.   I have been there, and I am still there in many ways.  It's difficult enough to discover your own truths without having people try to shove theirs down your throat.  Or be disrespectful to you because they think you're wrong.  Or try to "save" you by making you believe what they believe.  Or even torment you, paint things on your garage or house, or leave dead birds in your mailbox (all of which I know has happened to someone because it became public knowledge that she was a Pagan).

The thing that I find most disturbing about all of this is that in many ways all of the "religions" have the same basis of believe.  They are all basically good, that is until you mix in the "we're right and we know we're right and anyone that says we're wrong should be shot/burned/hanged/tortured/brain-washed/or whatever.  Believing that there IS a God, by whatever name you call Him/Her/It, and that that God says we should live by certain rules/commandments such as Don't kill, Don't steal, Don't lie, Treat folks like you want to be treated, should be enough to prove that we are more ALIKE than we are different.

The war that we are fighting now, the horrible, bloody war is because of our DIFFERENCES and everyone seems to forget that we are ALL just humans trying to worship as we see fit. (yeah, I know some religions say to kill anyone that don't believe as you do......well, that seems to go against the very basic teachings of those same religions, so I'm confused)  

You know, it's been asked "Why can't we all just get along?"  Well, I don't think it's in Human Nature to "just get along" with people who have the balls to disagree with us.  I think it's part of the "Tree of knowledge" thing in the Bible.  We weren't suppose to be this way.  We were created to be different than we are now and we (humans) screwed it up by being, well, human.

And in the midst of all of this noise, all of this hatred, confusion and grief.  In the middle of all of these people telling us that we are wrong for what we believe, or that we have to belief what they believe or else they will kill us, or even those who are trying to tell us what God is saying to US (which really pisses me off.  When God speaks to someone they don't need for another Human to tell them what He said.) there are people like myself.  People who are just trying to listen and understand what God is saying to us.

Okay, enough of this Crisis of Faith that I'm having and on to other subjects.

As some of you may know, I have a sister that lives in KC.  She is my one and only sibling and she is almost 7 years my junior.  Now, because of the way we were raised (separately), we have never had what could be called a "close" relationship.  Since our Mom passed away nine years ago I have only seen her once and that was at my grandson's funeral.  We don't talk on the phone, email or even write to one another.  I usually don't think about her at all.  But today is different.  Today is her birthday.  She was born 43 years ago today.

So here's to my sister, where ever you are, Happy Birthday.  Hope it's a good one.