Mom called me today, saying that Amber is concerned about me and how she thinks that I want her to quit going to church. It is this chasing a greater existence that religion teaches, that has kept us so completely enslaved. Never are we good enough. Religion teaches us that we are lowly and we must continually be unhappy with our current existence here because something greater exists beyond who we are here. Not until god saves us from ourselves do we become happy and paradise is reached. This idea of a greater existence than here; all of our troubles somehow are supposed to vanish and we will be finally in this kingdom of heaven, where all is wonderful. So we must earn our way to heaven by suffering enormously in this world and constantly strive and toil until we finally reach this promised land. Then all will be fine and god will rule over us, since we can never be as good as god. The bible teaches that Jesus died for our sins, and that he has payed the price for all man's sins past and present and future. Yet we must earn our way there. So there is this reward , which is heaven, that is greater than we can imagine. Greater than who we are here. So naturally we are inclined to be shameful of who we are here, because we are bad, even though god created us this way, we are forever in debt to god because he is supposed to save us from who we are. So if god is all knowing, and god is all good and perfect in every way, how can god create something that is less than perfect or bad? If god consists of nothing but good, how can he create something that is not good or not of god or less than that of which consists of god? If god created all that exists, and god is only good, then how can anything exist that isn't good? How can evil exist unless god, himself, created evil? So if god created evil, and god consists of nothing but good, then evil is also good and of god. All that exists is of god, because god supposedly created all that exists. So if I am evil, then I am exactly as god had created me. So how could I ever be any different than god created me? How could I ever change who I am if god created me to be as I am? All of the striving to become something other than who I am here, is simply an impossibility. So if god wants me to continually beg for forgiveness for my shortcomings, then it is god's creation of me as a less than him that he has created me, and I am only begging god to forgive me as he has created me. But it is not I that has created me to be as I am, so why would I have any responsibility in who I am? Why would I beg to be forgiven for something god has done himself? Asking god to forgive me for being less than perfect, even though it is exactly how he created me, would be nothing but asking god to forgive me for being exactly how he wanted me to be. So why would god need or want me to beg for his forgiveness for something he had done unto me? This is complete and utter nonsense.