To be blunt, conservative/fundamentalist Christians have, frankly, made me associate "Christianity" with stupidity, fanaticism, and blind hatred. Whether you think that's fair or not, I've had my share of bad experiences with religious types. Frankly, it takes a lot of self-discipline for me to not associate "God" with stupidity, fanaticism, and blind hatred too.
I'm not tremendously sure whether I fall under "agnostic" or if I just have beliefs that defy my current understanding of classification; but even then, after years of dealing with the rigid, but nonsensical structure of the Catholic Church, I'm not sure if I ever want to join another formal congregation. Put enough "religious types" in one room, and it always seems that the nuttiest ones attract the most attention. Still, although I have always been one to stick to my beliefs rather than compromise them to make friends (perhaps a testament to my rather insane standards of integrity), there's still some days where I wish I could have the community as well.
I have long ago reconciled the issue of God versus science, and, thankfully, in spite of all the nonsensical things I saw in the Catholic Church, they, at least, did not give me a hang-up over faith and science. As I see it, a lot of the age-old debate over good vs. evil and free will can be solved through mere reason.
God's idea of "perfection" and man's idea of "perfection" are not the same. Man defines perfection in truly human terms: complete uniformity in thought and culture, a world without choices...in other words, totalitarianism. As such, we have anthropomorphized "God" to assume that He carries the same prejudices that we have.
I believe that God defines perfection as perfection in form. In studying the universe, we've discovered something that is mindbogglingly complex, but orderly.
Earth, itself, is perfect as it is. If it had been larger, it might have attracted a larger atmosphere that may never have been supportive of life. Likewise, if it had been smaller, it might never have attracted a sufficient atmosphere. Its placement in the solar system is as "perfect" as it gets. Although we have to deal with periodic freezing and warming cycles, it's better than the alternatives--Venus and Mars.
Even the most violent of natural disasters serve a "perfect" purpose to maintain life on Earth. Without plate tectonics, which generates volcanoes and earthquakes, we would be as lifeless as Mars, as it is through this process that our crust recycles itself. Otherwise, Earth would be entirely nutrient-poor and flat as a cue ball. Hurricanes serve a very necessary purpose in sucking out massive amounts of heat in the tropics and sending it into colder regions to be dissipated. Otherwise, I have to think that the tropics might attain temperatures that would be enough to fry everyone and everything that lives there. As such, hurricanes are certainly better than the alternative.
Mankind, itself, is "perfect" in form, despite all this nonsense about us being "fallen." Without death, there would be no room for new life. None of us would be here today had our ancestors not died. There would be no need for reproduction, not to mention that there would be no room for everyone even if we could still reproduce. Our tendency towards extreme violence and extreme goodness shows our capacity for higher intelligence and emotion; you cannot have one extreme--goodness--without the other--evil. To merely have a choice to do good things is not to have a choice at all, and we would, as such, be no different from animals, who are generally strictly instinctual. "Good and evil," as defined by mankind, is a consequence of our free will.
And that's where I think the "mystery of God" sets in. If there is an "objective" idea of "perfection," I would rather appeal to logic, reason, and science, all of which would fall under "God's creation" (as would everything, theoretically), than a supposed "holy book" that's so full of hatred and illogical nonsense as to boggle my mind. Why the hell would it
ever have been wrong to make clothes with two different kinds of fibers anyway?
Having all these crazy people around this world run around thinking that they know exactly what God wants makes me think that we know much less about "God" than we think.
Melon