Don't tell me there is a loving, all-powerful "intelligent designer" who sits back allows this

Ed addition for alternative caption suggested by tommy: ""Because God Never Gives You More Than You Can Handle"

This image has been left imprinted in my mind for some time. A vulture stands there on the sidelines waiting for this innocent child to die so the bird of prey can swoop in and devour her. She is struggling to crawl to a foot station.

Yes, nature is quite cruel in the way of the survival of the fittest. It bothers me much though that god believers think that their god is good, and not a sadistic bastard for sitting back after creating a world which is set up in such cruelty, suffering and heartache. The suffering of innocent babies, and children come to my mind first, for they suffer the very most because they are so naive, helpless and dependent on others for their mere survival. No god is going to come rescue them if another human being is not around or does not care.

To say that there is an "intelligent designer" who invented the grand scheme of things would make this designer highly incompetent and unable to control his creations or to correct his errors at best, or at the worst, he is a sick, sadistic bastard who is all powerful but set up the world as a puppet stage to play who suffers, who doesn't, who dies, who doesn't...etc. The strong devour the weak. One living creature must kill and eat another for its own survival. While there is much beauty and awesomeness in the world, it is also a very violent, chaotic and cruel world and to say that this is all an all-knowing, all-powerful entity could think up is absurd. It is NATURE and life can be very good, or very cruel. Outside of natural happenings and disasters, it is totally up to other humans to help other humans. Not some sky genie.

While I was in the hospital with this serious illness, I saw firsthand how the religious take advantage of a sick person's vulnerability and sit on the sidelines and wait, and wait for the right moment to pounce. Most likely, their intentions are good ones based on their own worldview, and they believe they are showing loving concern that the atheist who is sick doesn't have that "afterlife insurance just in case" thing and their "just" god is going to send a very good person to eternal suffering in the pits of their mythical hell. I am sure that my relatives who are fundamentalists are indeed concerned about me, however they seem to be far more concerned about me AFTER I die! This is frightening and I am glad that there aren't many in the family or in my immediate family who think this way. The ones who bother me the most about it are only a few and they live out of town and I rarely talk to them.

The other morning I was calm and happy to be recovering. I am glad to be back home and on the mend. I still have medical problems I will have to deal with my whole life, but I can do it. I have a whole team of doctors who I trust and access to some of the best medical facilities in the world and insurance to pay for it. While I was happily checking my emails, there was one from one of those distant Baptist relative who after saying she would never, ever bring up "being saved" and religion to me again...LIED and brought it up again in a most disturbing and disrespectful way. She sent me a very "deep" email with emotional examples of sick people being sick because they reject god, and some Bible passages she told me to really focus on and consider. (cherry-picked just for me and I resisted the urge to cherry-pick some counter-passages back to her. This person forgets that I WAS an active and believing xian for a long time and a leader in several churches.) She implied that all of my problems are because I didn't trust god! (She just proved the "sadistic bastard" point to me again). She said my ulcers are from "anger" I am holding back towards her god! My ulcers are most likely from trying to spice up my food with jalapenos and other spicy stuff after I was not allowed salt anymore a few months ago ! They are clearing up with Protonix medication and staying away from spicy crap, praise Jeebus. ;)

I am not supposed to get upset or stressed out. But I was furious with this email because this person had lied to me....AGAIN FOR THE UMPTEENTH TIME. I want very much to stay in communication with her, and don't want to ban her from communication like I have been banned from communicating with a certain other fundamentalist twig of the family tree, so I will just not open anything that starts out with "I know I said I wouldn't bring this up again" and not read past that.

Most people in my family respect my beliefs or lack thereof. My parents are great. They offer physical help and my mom was so worried about me but she was there, and never once mentioned godly crap to me...she asked a lot about doctors and if they knew what they were doing though! That's what matters...if the doctor is an idiot or incompetent or not.

The Lutherans and the Catholics in the family don't do that preachy, cry-baby crap to me. (The Baptists cry and seemed to want to make it somehow morbid, like they expected death to come any minute and I MUST be saved and trust their version of this god being.) This person who sent me the email said that I was on the huge prayer list at her church and is why it was found that I didn't have LUPUS after all...however, she doesn't know everything except bits and pieces of what my folks told her via brief short telephone conversations, and I do have several other problems that are serious that she doesn't know about and won't. I don't want to be on any more oogie boogie prayer lists and it is insulting and maddening that I am on one at all. If it makes them happy to bring attention to themselves with it or makes them feel better in some way to put me on it DON'T TELL ME ABOUT IT. IT ONLY PISSES ME OFF.

I wrote this person back and said that I appreciate her concern and am glad that she is thinking of me in whatever way makes her feel better. But I told her I am a pretty upbeat person and have endured a lifetime of illnesses, from being born premature in the 50s, to suffering with severe asthma and other ailments as a child, to difficult and unusual pregnancies, the death of a newborn in delivery, a miscarriage, the loss of our middle son's twin during pregnancy, hysterectomy, benign liver tumors removed, Rheumatoid Arthritis, gout, pulmonary edema, abnormal water metabolic deficiency, irregular heartbeat, and the list goes on and on as it does for many people as they age. If these people believe god made us, then their god made me and many others "defective" and sits back and does nothing but let the doctors struggle to figure out how to fix his mess. Of course, that is not what I believe. I believe this crap happens in nature...survival of the fittest and the individual resilience and desire to keep on going for as long as we can. Believer or non, it's up to individual attitude. Look at all the studies that say patients who are prayed for do worse when they start feeling pity for themselves.

I also told this person that most of my roommates were god believers as were probably most of the people in the hospital I was in and many are far worse off than I am, and many younger, and many of them KIDS. Their families pray, they chant, they cry, they beg.....their loved ones are still sick and dying. Praying is pointless. They say so themselves..."god's will" which means to me, "that's life"...and we have to deal with it.

Back to the "vulture" example, it is sad that they must take advantage of the non-believer at stressful and difficult times of illness or distress. But for me, I believe being respectful and loving does not include telling me that a bad god is doing this to me because I cannot believe in something for which there is zero evidence or logic for.