You are not God!

I'm sick of people waving their Bibles around and telling me it's the Absolute Truth. You believe it is, and that's called Faith. But whatever wisdom the Bible may contain (and it certainly does contain some) was written by Man, edited (repeatedly) by men, and translated (repeatedly) by men. Then, ultimately, when you hold it in your hand, and you read the words that are in it, the Bible is interpretted by a man (or a woman), that is, by YOU.
Do you have God sitting next to you, literally, not figuretively, pointing at passages and telling you his opinions on them? No? Then you dont really know. Faith. Faith faith faith. Dont tell me God inspires you, because it's no the same thing. What you have is Faith, not Fact.

Faith is hard. You must believe something to be true, without having any proof (not, as so many seem to believe, in the face of contrary proof). Facts are (supposed to be) easy to believe. It's there in front of you. Even with things like the existence of atoms, there's not too much faith involved, somebody has seen proof of atoms, if not the atom itself. But really, who has seen God? Really seen Him, not "felt his presence", or been inspired by his "divine guidance". Have you got a reciept? If not, then however powerful an event of Faith it may have been, dont ask me to believe that your brush with God was a Fact. Before I believe you spoke with God, I want to see a photo of you and The Bearded Guy with your arms on each others shoulders (God making bunny ears would be a nice touch).
Adam and Eve spoke to God, but then they were basically his kids (and he eventually chucked them out of the house and told'em to get a job). Moses spoke to God, who gave him a laundry list of Good Behaviors. Abraham spoke to God, but only when He came to stop Abe from doing something really stupid (he's apparently since given that up as a bad job). In Modern Times there've been a lot of claims by people to have spoken with God, but most of these were rather suspect (David Koresh, for instance, or Oral Roberts thatGod was holding him hostage for more money for his University).

This rant comes after yet another day of listening to "Christians" vilify gays in there relentless quest for temporal power (this time in the form of Proposition 2 in Texas) . Apparently God has been telling these people His Plan for the World without telling the rest of us, and a very narrow, petty plan it is indeed.
One of my "favorite" arguements for marriage being only between one man and one woman is that Adam and Eve were the first married couple, so that's how God wanted it to be forever. They seem to have missed the extremely crucial point that Adam and Eve didnt really have much choice who to marry (except perhaps for Lilith). Suppose God had created 100 people rather than only two? Statistically, 5 of those Adams and 5 of those Eves would have turned to another one of their own sex (leaving one of each out in the cold, poor things). Would God have said, "Oops! Well, we'll just pretend that didnt happen shall we... And It Didnt".

The saddest thing about the very vocal, very visible, Fundamentalist Christian movement is that it's all about not doing things. Dont show your love for another Human Being by making a lifetime committment, unless you are one man and one woman. Dont even think about sex, except within the confines of marriage, between one man and one woman. Dont read the Bible any way but our way. Do only this, so only that. God, who is supposed to be omnipotent and omniscient, ought to be able to encompass many attitudes, beliefs, and creeds. Fundamentalists would attempt to stuff God into a box of their own making, thereby limiting God. If someone else having a different opinion is a threat to your faith, then how strong is your Faith, really?

Finally, if you're tired of Republicans who seem to think that they have a lock on Christian morality, then check out Jimmy Carter talking to Terry Gross on Fresh Air. This may be the only other place where I can recall someone taking BushCo to task, not only for the Iraq war, but for the un-American and immoral idea that a "pre-emptive strike" was good policy.