3-17-98Before all of you religious fanatics go crazy ("HOW DARE HE QUESTION THE IMPORTANCE OF GOD!?!?!?"), I would like to say that I have questioned my religion, researched other religions and I have been an atheist at one time so please don't lecture me on how to perceive God, gods, religion, or any other form of personal devotion. Religion is an individual's personal choice of lifestyle and belief which is not to be influenced by others. For once---let others be themselves without your "divine intervention"!

This is a recollection of an event which occurred at my high school a few days ago. Ever since it happened I have been wanting to write this article but I just kept forgetting to do so whenever the opportunity presented itself. So, without further ado (I love that phrase), I will begin.

I was in my English III-Honors class and we were having a class discussion about a novel. This class is not like your common high school English class. I am thoroughly convinced that my teacher, Mrs. Carolyn Anderson is a genius with a fantastic mind. She leads us in deep discussion no matter what the topic may be. And the subject of this discussion was "what is important in our lives?". However, this exact question hadn't directly come up and when it did, it just flowed right in with the rest of what we were speaking about. Let me explain that I live in a very Republican, right-wing, religious area where you are either very "Christian Coalition", or you are a down-home country folk with a country perception of religion. So when the answers came back from the other students, I was SHOCKED! She (Mrs. Anderson) asked if money was important to some people, and a couple said that it was. I quietly gave them praise for being honest. But the rest of the class gave a variety of answers, "Family (the most popular answer), friends, love, etc..." NOT ONE PERSON SAID GOD!!! This amazed me. I sit next to a minister's son, and two seats in front of me, sits a girl who was silenced (literally) when I told her I was Jewish (meaning: she is a devout Christian who believed the Jews killed Jesus). Even my best friend, "John", who is a very devout Catholic and private about his religion because he believes it is something you don't discuss or debate about, didn't say God. So I turned to him, privately, and asked him why he didn't say God was most important. Boy, did I catch him off guard! He was quiet and then stuttered in his response, "Well, of course God is the most important--of course, but so is family." So I replied, "Then why didn't you say God? Are you saying that if your entire family died, you wouldn't turn to God?" He knew what I was getting at and I could tell he had learned his lesson. So I didn't press the matter any further just to watch him squirm. But his reply was, "God is the most important thing to me." I knew what he meant so I was satisfied and we continued with the class discussion.

I wasn't trying to make him feel guilty for what he said, although that was a side effect, nor was I deliberately trying to prove his response wrong. I was simply proving that people may be religious, and follow their chosen religion with a powerful passion, but when it comes down to it, how important is God REALLY in our lives? Freud said that religion and God was man's method of dealing with the unanswerable and unaskable questions. Was he right?...

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