"Why do bad things happen to good people?"
When I was a Christian, I treated this question like all the others that challenged my faith - I had some programmed response to it, like "If only good things happened to good people, everyone would be good for the wrong reasons" and then pretty much ignored it, lest it lead me astray from the flock. I never asked questions. The people in church told me asking questions was good, because it would strengthen me in the Lord, but I was always proud of my blind-as-a-bat faith and never had any questions. All would be revealed to me when I got to heaven, or so I thought.
Then everything hit me all at once - reality, I mean. Inside the church, people were struggling, denying who they were to please some higher power, while people on the outside could live their lives and be who they were and, as long as they were careful, usually turn out pretty okay. I saw my friends doing "bad" things, and at first felt totally hurt. Then I fell in love and a different side of me was revealed. I realized that I've always been a very sexual person. I've always felt beautiful in lingerie and had fantasies about treating some special man to the delights of my body. This realization was met with denial and even horror, but once I learned to let myself go, I felt so much better. Now I do have a question - Why do people feel that it's good for them to deny who they really are?
My mother is a single parent of two. She has a boyfriend she never touches, because they aren't married. She works very hard in a business full of sharks, but refuses to cheat. All my life, our family has just barely gotten by. We've never been able to afford luxuries like health insurance or college or retirement funds. My mom's probably going to be eating cat food when she's old, and yet she keeps going because she believes God is going to take care of her. Today I realized that she's one of those "good people", and bad things just keep happening to her. No one is taking care of her or looking out for her. It's really sad to watch. But I'm not going to let it happen to me. I figure bad things are going to happen to me either way, so I'm going to live the way I want. I'm also going to be responsible and look out for myself, so maybe the bad things wont be so bad.
Being a Christian has done something worthwhile for me, though.
When I was a Christian, I treated this question like all the others that challenged my faith - I had some programmed response to it, like "If only good things happened to good people, everyone would be good for the wrong reasons" and then pretty much ignored it, lest it lead me astray from the flock. I never asked questions. The people in church told me asking questions was good, because it would strengthen me in the Lord, but I was always proud of my blind-as-a-bat faith and never had any questions. All would be revealed to me when I got to heaven, or so I thought.
Then everything hit me all at once - reality, I mean. Inside the church, people were struggling, denying who they were to please some higher power, while people on the outside could live their lives and be who they were and, as long as they were careful, usually turn out pretty okay. I saw my friends doing "bad" things, and at first felt totally hurt. Then I fell in love and a different side of me was revealed. I realized that I've always been a very sexual person. I've always felt beautiful in lingerie and had fantasies about treating some special man to the delights of my body. This realization was met with denial and even horror, but once I learned to let myself go, I felt so much better. Now I do have a question - Why do people feel that it's good for them to deny who they really are?
My mother is a single parent of two. She has a boyfriend she never touches, because they aren't married. She works very hard in a business full of sharks, but refuses to cheat. All my life, our family has just barely gotten by. We've never been able to afford luxuries like health insurance or college or retirement funds. My mom's probably going to be eating cat food when she's old, and yet she keeps going because she believes God is going to take care of her. Today I realized that she's one of those "good people", and bad things just keep happening to her. No one is taking care of her or looking out for her. It's really sad to watch. But I'm not going to let it happen to me. I figure bad things are going to happen to me either way, so I'm going to live the way I want. I'm also going to be responsible and look out for myself, so maybe the bad things wont be so bad.
Being a Christian has done something worthwhile for me, though.