I've never considered myself an atheist, but I saw a new definition of atheist when I went to the Unitarian Fellowship here.

It's about the only kind of church where I don't feel like I'll be struck by lightning as soon as I cross the threshold. Ok, that's not true... but I think Jesus was a vegetarian hippie who would have totally been into gay rights. So, perhaps I'm not in danger of being struck by lightning, but rather by stampeding Catholics. Hey, how do I get excommunicated? Anyone know?

Anyway. So I stumbled across this definition of "atheist" which read like this: "atheist, or A-theist: Someone who believes the concept of Theism, or a Deity, is not helpful." Period. Well, that makes a whole lot of sense!

I've never been into that whole Deity thing. The only kind of god I can believe in is Love. If the beauty I see in people, their ability to love... if I can call *that* god, then I'm ok with spirituality on a grand scale.

But as soon as people start saying that god is some guy hanging out in the sky, who knows all, sees all, and is all powerful, well... the logic falls apart and so does faith.

I may have grown up Catholic, but I am not illogical. Seems to me that "faith" is another way of saying "Because I said so."

If god is good AND all powerful, then September 11th (and a whole bunch of other crap in world history) wouldn't have happened. It really IS that simple. God either Isn't ALL good, or god isn't all powerful. One or the other.

I like the way the Onion said it best, though, in the "God clarifies No Kill Rule". Look at the Sept 11 issue... http://www.theonion.com