Tales and traumas of a 'Teenage Drama Queen'

Religion seems to have been a large part of my life lately. So last night when I decided I was sick of barely going out I agreed to go to a gig called "sold-out". The only problem was that it was a Christian thing. So, of course I was going to be out of place- what with my growing scepticism and feelings of bitterness towards religion in general. The music wasn't bad, but unsurprisingly there was a break in the middle where they had a 'chat' to us.

The man who was talking up on the stage was a perfectly nice guy, but he was preaching about what was, in my opinion, an extremely debatable subject. He was talking about purity. About how every person starts life as a "pure" being, but because of the mistakes they make they become "impure". He went on to explain that God was the most "pure" person in creation, and that the reason that he doesn't help people in unfortunate situations is because he doesn't want to become "impure" himself. This, of course, is the christian comeback to the standard anti-christianity question "How can god exist when there is so much suffering in the world?"

The entire time he was talking, I was staring, unfocused, at an extremely boring patch of incredibly bland carpet, but my mind was working overtime. I was thinking about everything he said, only unlike most of the people around me I wasn't agreeing with it. No; involuntarily my mind was forming arguments to almost everything he said. And at the time they seemed perfectly clear, only of course by this morning I had forgotten them. A shame really, it would have made an interesting debate. When he had finished he asked the people who wanted to too bow their heads down and say a prayer of thanks to God for allowing him into their hearts to purify their souls. It was around about then that the blank white ceiling suddenly became rather more interesting than the patch of carpet.

It's not that I was deliberately being rude, but by this point my invariably over-reactive mind had gone into over-drive and I was fuming; not only about religion but about the reaction which this simple preaching session had brought upon me. It doesn't help that lately I have been thinking a lot about my little sister, Emily, and how much I miss her. In fact, one of the arguments I thought of during the speach was to do with this sort of situation. I was wondering whether, according to his argument about purification and such-like, people were to blame for ever little thing that happened to them. For instance, when the parents of a small child get divorced, is it that child's fault when they then spend the next however many years suffering at the centre of a highly fueled legal battle? This is why I'm not religious; For me Christianity is to contradictory and I have too many questions that are not satisfactorily answered.

I don't mean to be entirely negative, the man talking did actually make a good analogy. This was that in life humans are very much like hamsters; we wake up in the morning, run around in a wheel going no-where, and then go back to sleep. What is the point. However, his answer to this, of course, was that GOD is the point.

I have loads more to say on this subject, but I'm getting to tired now! If you've got any opinions don't hesitate to talk to me, but I don't want to fight. I'll end by pointing out that despite the flaws I see in religion, and Christianity in particular, my best friend is a recently converted christian, and we are still great friends.

xxx