a letter to god

A letter to God
I can't believe it appeared in The Australian Zionist, I like the letter


October 09, 2004
DEAR God,
Was John Steinbeck right when he wrote that the prayers of the millions must fight and destroy each other on the way to your throne? I suppose so, what with everyone wanting to win the lottery of life or love, not to mention the lottery itself. So many requests, appeals and entreaties. And all those proffered deals.

“Dear God, if you get me through this illness, business deal, crash landing or pregnancy test, I’ll renounce smoking, denounce the Devil, make a generous donation to charity or sacrifice a goat.”

Well, God, you can’t say that my prayers have been clogging the system. The first and last time I prayed to you was way back in 1944, when I was five. Underwhelmed by your response, I haven’t bothered, or bothered you, since. But today, Election Day 2004, I thought I’d try again. On the off chance that, a) you do exist, and b) when not noting the fall of sparrows, you take a passing interest in human affairs.

This is my prayer – and I pray on behalf of many millions of my fellow Australians. Dear God, don’t let Howard get re-elected.

Like the ABC, I’m often accused of political bias. But let’s be frank about this. If anyone has shown appalling bias in recent times, it’s been YOU!

God, be honest. Right around the world you’ve been helping political conservatives. While your son Jesus was clearly left-wing in his attitudes, wanting the meek to inherit the Earth and that sort of thing, you’ve signed up for Bush’s Republicans, Blair’s New Labour and three Howard governments. Moreover, around the world, extremists and fanatics claim your wholehearted approval for their various rampages.

Whether it’s bin Laden or the Bush administration, God or Allah. Which, I understand, is one of your many pseudonyms.

Forgive me for being parochial but let’s focus on Australia where, in a serious lapse of judgement akin to creating the hyena and the flu virus, you let Howard get elected in the first place. And then re-bloody-elected for a second time when he was behaving appallingly to refugees. Had Jesus survived drowning on one of the SIEVs and landed on Australian shores, Howard’s razor-wire gang would have jailed him at Woomera.

Just because the PM’s a member of the Lyons Forum [a Christian lobby group], just because half his front bench go to prayer breakfasts, was no reason to give him the nod. You’ve caused much spiritual pain to the good Jesuits and Josephites who were working so hard for compassionate refugee policies.

(To be frank, you’re behaving a bit like the Pope, who prefers Opus Dei to members of religious orders fighting for social justice.)

As for the mess in the Middle East, you’ve only yourself to blame. Why the hell did you permit the development of all the monotheistic faiths in exactly the same place? Beginning with Akhenaten in Ancient Egypt and going on to the Jews, the Christians and the Muslims. Talk about a recipe for disaster! And now it’s even worse – with American fundamentalists and followers of millenarian television evangelists seeing modern Israel playing a crucial part in the Rapture, Armageddon and all that Last Judgement stuff.

Bush hardly lets a moment pass without claiming to be acting on your personal instructions, as do bin Laden and the boys, not to mention the ultra orthodox Jews. Is their behaviour delusional? Not officially sanctioned? Then it’s time to make this perfectly clear.

This very day, show your disapproval of religious intolerance by booming down in that great big voice of yours. Something along the lines of your Son – about loving thy enemy, turning the other cheek, suffering little children to come unto. Even a timely reminder of “Thou shalt not kill” wouldn’t be entirely wasted.

But first things first. You could begin to balance your bias in favour of bully-boy born-agains by refusing Howard a quadrella of election victories. I’m not asking for a landslide to Labor. Just a few thousand votes in those marginal electorates would do it. No need for anything overly spectacular, for some latter-day version of Gomorrah (yes, we’ll leave Sodom out of it – it’s a bit too embarrassing for the RCs and the C of E). All I’m asking, praying, is that you let Latham over the line.

He doesn’t even have to be first preferences. Wouldn’t mind at all if you favoured the Greens who, after all, are doing their best to salvage what’s left of your Garden of Eden. And if you want to arrange the bodily resurrection of the Australian Democrats, that’s fine with me. As long as you make sure that all the second preferences go to Labor. Except in Mayo and Bennelong, where I’d like you to help Brian Deegan and Andrew Wilkie.

Thanks to the physical laws you’ve provided for our benefit, pendulums swing. So do voters. And so should you. You don’t have to hand out how-to-vote cards, but what about little clay tablets with just one commandment, “Thou shalt not vote for the Coalition”?

But if Howard wins, God forgive you. I’m one of millions who won’t.