Interesting responses to yesterday's post, both via email and in the comments section, have led me to continue that issue further.  If you thought it was boring the first time then I suggest you not read further today.  If you've got the stomach for a little more of it, then put on your Let's Pretend hat again and enter the world where God is real...

First off, everybody read the comments from yesterday, because both the emails I got made essentially the same points.  The gist is that prayers are necessary because God wrote them into The Plan, even though He knew everything beforehand and didn't really need the prayers; He just wants you to say it to formalize the arrangement.  He wants us to be reminded of our involvement in The Plan, and to drive home our relationship with Him via prayer.   By showing God that we are thinking about Him enough to tip our heads and close our eyes for a second, we score points with Him. 

I dunno, none of that stuff makes the least bit of sense to me.  It sounds like people are claiming that God knows everything, including what we really think and feel, yet he wants us to think some of it especially hard whilst bowing our heads just for the hell of it.  Apparently He wrote into The Plan that we are going to waste time telling him stuff he already knows, and if that's true then I've gotta wonder if the rest of his plan isn't likewise horribly inefficient and illogical.  

If He wanted to reinforce our relationship with Him then why not, oh I don't know, give us a single bloody reason to believe he exists?  Why not actually interact with us, if our connection with Him is so important?  Or, alternatively, if it's all supposed to be about faith and not about actually knowing He's up there, then why should we try to reinforce a concrete relationship with him through prayer?  Shouldn't we just have faith that He hears our thoughts and wishes and is doing His best?  Why should we need a physical, concrete process to strengthen our resolve?  Doesn't that show that our faith isn't strong enough?

As for using prayer to score points with God, I would think most prayer would do just the opposite if God has any sense of justice.  Most people pray primarily when they want shit, which must feel pretty much like having kids who only call when they need money.  Not to mention that people are encouraged to use form-letter prayers and recite devotional passages from memory; God already knows if we are sincerely impressed or thankful, so why would He want us to recite mass-produced Hallmark prayers in a transparent attempt to kiss His celestial ass?

Plus, I have to think that the "Wow" type of prayers are pretty lame coming from beings as far below God as we are, since we can't possibly appreciate the scope of his creation.  Humans are so far below any Originating Force that our praise on God's work would be like a preschooler telling a brain surgeon that he did a nice job; it's sweet and all, but it doesn't really mean anything because the kid doesn't have the faintest idea what really went on. 

Hell, we humans are probably impressed by all the wrong things anyway.  We look at a sunset and go, "Wow, what wonder of Creation!" or get all wet-eyed when we see a rainbow, all while God is sitting there thinking, "Why don't they ever notice the topsoil?  Sunrise and meteorological phenomena are easy, but topsoil was really hard!  They just don't understand me and my needs as an artist.  I'm going to eat a bucket of ice cream."

Okay, the Let's Pretend hat is giving me a migraine, so we'll take a breather.  I'll try to come up with something cheerfully secular for tomorrow...perhaps something on DemFest Boston 2004?

UPDATE: As usual, the Devil's Dictionary said it better in a sentence than I have in many paragraphs..."Pray, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy."