A Hell of Heaven
I do not believe in Hell, which is a shame.
[Any
fundamentalist Christian who reads this would readily agree. "It's a
shame, all right," they'd say. "Otherwise you'd be making some
effort to avoid damnation, but you're not, so off to Hell with you."
But then, I don't think any Christian fundamentalists will ever read
this;
ergo, no reason to be concerned.]
I set out on the road to not believing in Hell in junior high or
thereabouts. Actually, I started out on the road to eternal
damnation by not believing in eternal damnation. I never could
understand how a finite amount of sin could justify an infinite
amount of punishment. Seemed a bit petty for a Being chalked up with
Creating the Entire Universe. Pulling out that brick eventually
resulted in the whole Christian edifice, as it was described in the
Methodist church in mid-20th century Alabama, collapsing into utter
ruin, at least in my mind. As it fell, other bricks were jettisoned:
Hell, bodily resurrection, virgin birth, original sin, and a whole
host of easy targets tumbled onto the desert sands.
I’ve since reconstructed my own form of christianity, but it still
lacks a Hell. Atheism was never an option, and agnosticism is
ultimately so unsatisfying. If you wait for proof of divinity, if
you require the Godhead to satisfy your personal curiosity with a
demonstration… well, eternal damnation may not make sense, but some
things can still seem to take an infinite amount of time.
So, given this theological prologue, why should I consider my
unbelief in the fiery pit a shame? Simply put, I think that is the
only place George W. Bush (and Cheney, and Rumsfeld, etc.) would
ever have been made to serve time (not eternal!) for the grievous
and manifold sins they have perpetrated on the American people, the
Iraqi people, and the World in general.
I have been accused (in these pages, actually) of being a water boy
for the DNC, which is a little silly. I am not a registered
Democratic, I vote in every election for the person, as I understand
him (or her), who most nearly coincides with my world view. And
there have been many elections where that overlap has been decidedly
minimal; still, between (or among) candidates, it has always been at
least discernible. I have voted independent (Anderson in ’80), and
even Republican (Governor Riley in Alabama’s last election: I think
he’s done a decent job, is fiscally responsible, and sees no need to
legislate morality, at least not too obtrusively). I imagine that’s
more “cross-voting” than many Republicans will have done.
The point of my lack of party affiliaiton? Far from being a DNC
water boy, I am chagrined and appalled at the lack of political
backbone in the Democrat Party. There will almost certainly never
be any form of censure, much less the impeachment, conviction
and imprisonment, that BushCheneyRumsfeld so overwhelmingly deserve.
The Democratics just won’t stand up and do the right thing. For
every Feingold or Obama, there are far too many Conyers and Reids
and Kerrys.
The fact that Bill Clinton was actually impeached, and brought to
trial in the Senate, for what was essentially a dalliance and simple
lies about his behavior, while W. Bush will never even be
reprimanded, that is also a “shame”. Like Bob Dylan said, in another
context,
“I’m ashamed
To live in a land
Where justice is a game.”
George W. Bush has lied, not only to Congress, but to the country
and to the world, about the reasons for his Iraq war; has mismanaged
the war with an ineptitude that is criminal; has ignored the
Constitution with impunity and undermined our rights as citizens;
has illegally wire-tapped his own countrymen; has issued more than
500 signing statements to laws that he disagrees with, flouting his
obligation to enforce the law, thumbing his nose at Republican and
Democrat Congresses alike. Clinton was impeached for having oral sex
in the Oval office, and then covering it up. W. Bush will get a
complete pass for trampling the Bill of Rights, reversing the intent
of the Freedom Of Information Act, sucking up the budget surplus
left him by Clinton and driving us into the deepest debt the country
has ever known.
No, Bush will not be punished, not ever in this lifetime, not even
by any self-inflicted dark tea-time of the soul. The moral capacity
that might eventully catch up with and cause self-torment in most
men and women, given the enormity of such transgressions, is simply
missing in the man. The ethical imperative will fall like water off
a duck in the case of G.W. Bush: he simply does not have the moral
or ethical or critical discernment to realize where his actions have
placed him on the scale of offenses waged against humanity. I mean,
the fool thinks he’s getting all these ideas from God, for
chrissake!
No, he will walk out of the White House, and amble back to Crawford,
fencing and chain-sawing and driving his pickup, oblivious to the
disasters he has left in his wake. There will be no punishment,
although I’m willing to bet that his Secret Service contingent will
be a lot larger than his fellow ex-Presidents. There are
people who will desire justice in the temporal plane, belated or
not, and Crawford looks to be wide-open territory. Best to see to
your fences, and with a will!
As for me… well, it’s just a shame that I don’t believe in Hell,
that’s all.
But you know, it would be interesting to see how Dick Cheney and Osama Bin Laden reacted when they finally met each other there.