I believe...

I grew up Catholic, went to Catholic school and church every Sunday and holiday. While I don't subscribe to every single doctrine of my church, I do believe in a higher power. I don't know exactly where my belief begins and where it ends because I question lots of biblical teachings and know that, rationally, lots of it is complete bull.

I also grew up in the United States where church and state are supposed to be separate. In my little Catholic school jumper and saddle shoes, I learned how we are all free to practice our faiths as wish. And even though the only faith I ever came into contact with was my own, I believed this happened in my country. I knew there were other churches in my little neighborhood and I knew people attended them and I was fine with that.

I'm not threatened by the beliefs of other people. I'm fine with the fact that other people believe things different from me. I'm also fine with the fact that some people don't believe at all. Great, awesome, welcome to America where we can all believe what we want and no one hurts each other or has to practice their faith in secret.

We can even put up billboards:






Oh wait...not in Cincinnati we can't. In Cincinnati, if you put up a billboard like that, you get death threats and you have to take it down within 48 hours. Yeah...you get death threats from the people who believe in God and are supposed to be Christian. I remember a song we used to sing in Catholic school "They'll know we are Christians by our Love." I remember hating the melody but thinking the lyrics were a nice message...that a Christian would be so obvious because of their unconditional love for each other and the rest of humanity. I'm pretty sure even Catholic school jumper and saddle shoes Calen didn't believe you were supposed to make death threats against the non-believers. I'm pretty sure even that Calen knew that making death threats (even to people who are publicly admitting they don't believe in God) isn't very god-like or Christian.

And I'm pretty sure lots of other people know that too...