The old man struggles as he puts on his olive green winter coat. A recent steroid injection and two weeks of high-dose Prednisone lessened the arthritic pain in his right shoulder, but pain and debility remain. Eventually, the old man wrestles his coat into compliance, puts on his matching fedora, and heads for the front door.
The old man stops at the door, ensuring Petey, the Ferret — a year-old cat — doesn’t dash towards it. Petey thinks freedom awaits if he can just get out the door, but the old man knows cars, injury, and death await instead.
No ornery cat today. No hollering at Petey as he tests his “freedom.” The old man starts the car with his key fob. A heated seat and steering wheel await him as he drags his right leg and then his left into the driver’s compartment. The old man stopped driving four years ago, but his partner’s knee replacement forced him back into service. Short drives, such as this one, are fine, but longer drives, say to Fort Wayne or Toledo, challenge the old man’s cognitive and physical abilities.
The old man backs out on the road, puts the car in gear, and heads for the local high school for a basketball game. The old man loves high school basketball and to a lesser degree football. The local school district gives residents sixty-five and older a free pass to school events, so the only cost today will be the money the old man spends at the concession stand.
The local high school, five miles away, sits on U.S. Hwy 127. Other area schools took advantage of cheap money from the state of Ohio to build new buildings over the past two decades, but not the old man’s school district. The area is dominated by white Republican farmers, and the local school district’s attempt to pass a new building levy failed several times. Eventually, a maintenance levy was passed, covering building and property renovations and improvements. The old man appreciates having the lowest real estate taxes in rural northwest Ohio; however, he can’t help but wonder how wise it was to spend millions of dollars fixing up buildings when that money could have been used to replace a sixty-year-old facility with a state-of-the-art school plant.
The old man pulls into the school parking lot, seeing a handicapped parking spot next to the front door. “Awesome,” the old man says to himself. He has on more than one occasion had to park far from the front door, resulting in exhaustion by the time he enters the school. Walking short distances exhausts him too, but less exhaustion is always good, so the old man is hopeful that tonight is a “less pain” night.
The old man walks into the building, past the ticket taker (who knows he has a pass), 50/50 drawing, and athletic booster’s table, and into the gymnasium. He nods and smiles at fellow basketball fans, as he makes his way to half-court. The old man tries to always sit in the same place, two or three rows up from floor level. Navigating the stairs proves challenging, so the old man tries to sit as close to the hardcourt as possible.
As is his custom, the old man arrives at the game an hour before start time. Doing so allows him to take a deep breath and situate himself in the stands, making sure people aren’t sitting close enough to him to inflict pain. Arriving early is very much part of the old man’s DNA. Earlier this year, the varsity basketball coach, the old man’s neighbor, asked why he arrived so early to the games. The old man replied, “When my partner and I first married, we drove junk automobiles. Flat tires were common. So, when going somewhere, we always left early enough to change a tire if we had a flat. The habit stuck, so I tend to be early for e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g.”
Situated in his seat, the old man watches as the junior varsity game begins. An hour and a half later, he haltingly stands, removes his hat, and sings the Star Spangled Banner before the start of the varsity game.
The stands are packed. The old man took 20 mg of hydrocodone before he left home, and now he takes 20 mg more, hoping to lessen the pain he feels rising in his body from head to toe. Pain-free is never an option, but hopefully, narcotic pain meds will reduce the pain enough that the game becomes a pleasant distraction.
Not long after the start of the varsity game, the old man feels a sudden jolt to his whole body. His seat is on the aisle just in case he needs to suddenly use the bathroom or leave. Up and down the aisle run three elementary-aged children, jumping up on the seat above him, and then down to the aisle, causing the old man’s seat to bounce up and down, jolting his body with excruciating pain.
The old man doesn’t blame the kids. “Kids will be kids,” he tells himself. “If these were my grandchildren, they would be doing the same.” The old man, however, does blame parents. “Children should be taught not to jump/run in the stands; that the stands aren’t for play.”
By the time, the game ends in a three-point loss for the home team, the old man has been repeatedly abused by running, jumping, and laughing children. He haltingly stands, and once the aisle is clear, he makes his way to the floor. Leaving the gym, he retraces the steps back to his car. Ice had fallen since he arrived, covering the windshield. The old man starts the car turns on the defroster, and retrieves the ice scraper from the trunk. Once the windshield is ice-free, the old man returns home, stopping first at the post office to get the mail.
Coat off, shoes, off, hat off, clothes switched for sweat pants and a tee shirt, the old man walks to the living room and flops on the couch. His partner asks her typical questions: How was the game? Who won? How do you feel? Questions answered, the old man tells his partner about the running, jumping children, a story she has heard countless times before. She feels sorry for the love of her life, knowing that there is little she can do for him.
Several days later the old man recounts his week to his therapist, telling her, “Maybe I should have stayed home, but I am in pain whether I go to the game or not, so I might as well go. Pain is ever with me, and unless I want to be a recluse, I must force myself to get out of the house, knowing it is good for me.”
The old man knows he can’t keep people from killing him one step, one jump, and one bang at a time. No matter how carefully he manages his environment, those around him are unaware of his struggle with chronic, unrelenting pain. He looks like the typical grandpa, but unless those around him carefully read his face, they will never know how much pain he is in. This is his burden to bear, and if he wants to enjoy what life he has left, this is the price of admission he must pay.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
This is the latest installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series, which I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent toward religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.
Today’s Song of Sacrilege is Runnin’ With the Devil by Van Halen.
I live my life like there’s no tomorrow All I’ve got, I had to steal Least I don’t need to beg or borrow Yes, I’m livin’ at a pace that kills Ooh, yeah
Ah (runnin’ with the Devil) Ah, ah-ha yeah, whoo-hoo-ooh (Runnin’ with the Devil) I’ll tell you all about it
I found the simple life ain’t so simple When I jumped out on that road I got no love, no love you’d call real Ain’t got nobody waitin’ at home
Ah (runnin’ with the Devil) God-damn it lady, you know I ain’t lying to ya I’m only gonna tell you one time Ah-yeah (Runnin’ with the Devil) Yes I am, yeah
Whoo Whoo
You know I- I found the simple life, once so simple, no When I jumped out on that road Got no love, no love you’d call real Got nobody waitin’ at home
Ah-yeah (Runnin’ with the Devil) Oh God, oh God, I’m runnin’, oh yeah (Runnin’ with the Devil) Ugh, ugh, one more time
Ah, yeah (Runnin’ with the Devil) Oh yeah, oh yeah-yeah (Runnin’ with the Devil) Whoo, whoo (Runnin’ with the Devil) Ah-ah-yeah, ah-ah-yeah, ah-ah-yeah (Runnin’ with the Devil) Whoo
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
As President Donald Trump, Co-President Elon Musk, and MAGA Republicans run roughshod over the government, causing chaos, heartache, and harm, there’s little being done in opposition by those who are in positions of power to fight back. Instead, Democratic politicians, corporate CEOs, and others once known for progressive values have abandoned past diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI) and other “woke” policies, revealing that they never really were committed to these things. All that matters to these turncoat politicians and executives is remaining in power, improving corporate profits, and increasing shareholder value. Who cares if people of color, working-class people and other marginalized people are hurt in the process. When my partner lost her job last year due to downsizing, I reminded her that, to the company, she was just a line entry on a spread sheet. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that most workers are just a means to an end; that when choosing between profits and what’s best for employees, companies will almost always choose the bottom line.
In the United States, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are organizational frameworks that seek to promote the fair treatment and full participation of all people, particularly groups who have historically been underrepresented or subject to discrimination based on identity or disability. These three notions (diversity, equity, and inclusion) together represent “three closely linked values” which organizations seek to institutionalize through DEI frameworks. The concepts predate this terminology and other variations sometimes include terms such as belonging, justice, and accessibility.
I, for the life of me, don’t understand why a politician or corporation wouldn’t, on principle, embrace DEI. Sure, much like you, I find some DEI policies to either be ineffective or nonsensical, but that doesn’t mean the core values represented by the DEI acronym should be done away with.
The same goes for the term “woke.” The MAGA proud-loud-and-stupid-as-a-brick-crowd are against all things “woke” even though most of them couldn’t define the word if their lives depended on it.
Elaine Richardson, a professor of literacy studies at Ohio State University, defines “woke” this way: “In simple terms, it just means being politically conscious and aware, like stay woke.” [The word woke] “comes out of the experience of Black people of knowing that you have to be conscious of the politics of race, class, gender, systemic racism, ways that society is stratified and not equal.”
Again, setting extremes such as “defund the police” aside, it seems, at least to me, that being woke is desirable in a progressive society; and that progress requires an alert, awake citizenry. While I certainly roll my eyes at some of the extremes found within DEI and woke groups, in the main I fully embrace the values expressed by these words. It is doubtful that one can be a humanist, socialist, and progressive without embracing DEI and woke values. I take that back. It is rationally impossible for someone to be a humanist, socialist, and progressive without, in general, embracing DEI and woke values. We can, must, and should argue, debate, and fight about specific DEI/woke positions, but abandoning a century of progress for the rabid libertarianism promoted by Trump and his fellow MAGA followers is not the path forward for the United States. Drunk on Christian nationalism, racism, jingoism, xenophobia, imperialism, militarism, and capitalism, Trump and his merry band of uber-rich libertarians will not rest until they bring on the collapse of federal/state governments and our society as a whole. The goal is to return the United States to a time before government regulations and progressive social programs. All that matters is unrestrained personal freedom for white Christians and record profits for American oligarchs. Once you buy into the lie that the United States is a white capitalistic Christian nation; a nation divinely chosen by the God of the Bible to rule and reign over all the earth (under Jesus, of course, though what Jesus wants and MAGA wants seems to be one and the same). Evangelicals and conservative Roman Catholics now control key positions within the Trump administration, and with an atheist president pretending to be Christian sitting in the White House, it’s clear that this true-to-life telling of George Orwell’s “1984” will continue unabated for at least the next two years. And here’s the thing: much of what Trump is doing is perfectly legal, the spoils of winning the 2024 presidential election. Democrats can scream all they want, but Trump won the election fair and square. We must now face the consequences of a woefully uneducated populous electing a man who is a pathological liar; a man who doesn’t care one bit about their lives; a contemptuous man who only cares about power and wealth. I can’t think of one thing Trump has done since 2015 that reflects compassion for others.
Trump’s recent comments about the Palestinian people reveals the kind of man he really is. Trump only sees a business opportunity, one that will make him look good at the expense of millions of Palestinian men, women, and children. In some ways, Trump is no different from other American presidents; men who used violence and bloodshed to advance personal and political agendas. Trump wants to use bulldozers to turn Gaza into a canvas upon which he and his fellow billionaires can paint a beautiful picture of real estate development — the Riviera of the Middle East. No thought is given to the Palestinian people; the poor, marginalized, and disadvantaged; people who have lost everything because of Israel’s genocidal war against them.
Here’s what Trump had to say at a White House news conference with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as reported in Al Jazeera::
Today I’m delighted to welcome Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu back to the White House. It’s a wonderful feeling and a wonderful event. We had fantastic talks, and thank you very much, with your staff.
I want to say it’s an honour to have you with us. Over the past four years, the US and the Israeli alliance has been tested more than any time in history, but the bonds of friendship and affection between the American and Israeli people have endured for generations and they are absolutely unbreakable.
I’m confident that, under our leadership, the cherished alliance between our two countries will soon be stronger than ever. We had a great relationship. We had great victories together four years ago, not so many victories over the past four years, however. In my first term, prime minister and I forged a tremendously successful partnership that brought peace and stability to the Middle East like it hadn’t seen in decades.
Together, we defeated ISIS [ISIL], we ended the disastrous Iran nuclear deal, one of the worst deals ever made, and imposed the toughest ever sanctions on the Iranian regime. We starved Hamas and Iran’s other terrorist proxies, and we starved them like they had never seen before, resources and support disappeared for them.
I recognised Israel’s capital, opened the American embassy in Jerusalem and got it built. We got it built. It’s beautiful, all Jerusalem stone right from nearby and it was – it’s something that’s very special.
And recognised Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, something that they talked about for 70 years and they weren’t able to get it. And I got it. And with the historic Abraham Accords, something that was really an achievement that was, I think, going to become more and more important because we achieved the most significant Middle East peace agreements in half a century.
And I really believe that many countries will soon be joining this amazing peace and economic development transaction. It really is a big economic development transaction. I think we’re going to have a lot of people signing up very quickly. Unfortunately, for four years, nobody signed up. Nobody did anything for four years except in the negative.
Unfortunately, the weakness and incompetence of those past four years, the grave damage around the globe that was done, including in the Middle East, grave damage all over the globe. The horrors of October 7th would never have happened if I were president, the Ukraine and Russia disaster would never have happened if I were president.
Over the past 16 months, Israel has endured a sustained aggressive and murderous assault on every front, but they fought back bravely. You see that and you know that. What we have witnessed is an all-out attack on the very existence of a Jewish state in the Jewish homeland. The Israelis have stood strong and united in the face of an enemy that has kidnapped, tortured, raped and slaughtered innocent men, women, children and even little babies.
I want to salute the Israeli people for meeting this trial with courage and determination and unflinching resolve. They have been strong. In our meetings today, the prime minister and I focused on the future, discussing how we can work together to ensure Hamas is eliminated and ultimately restore peace to a very troubled region.
It’s been troubled, but what has happened in the last four years has not been good.
I also strongly believe that the Gaza Strip, which has been a symbol of death and destruction for so many decades and so bad for the people anywhere near it, and especially those who live there and frankly who’s been really very unlucky. It’s been very unlucky. It’s been an unlucky place for a long time.
Being in its presence just has not been good and it should not go through a process of rebuilding and occupation by the same people that have really stood there and fought for it and lived there and died there and lived a miserable existence there. Instead, we should go to other countries of interest with humanitarian hearts, and there are many of them that want to do this and build various domains that will ultimately be occupied by the 1.8 million Palestinians living in Gaza, ending the death and destruction and frankly bad luck.
This can be paid for by neighbouring countries of great wealth. It could be one, two, three, four, five, seven, eight, 12. It could be numerous sites, or it could be one large site. But the people will be able to live in comfort and peace and we’ll make sure something really spectacular is done.
They’re going to have peace. They’re not going to be shot at and killed and destroyed like this civilisation of wonderful people has had to endure. The only reason the Palestinians want to go back to Gaza is they have no alternative. It’s right now a demolition site. This is just a demolition site. Virtually every building is down.
They’re living under fallen concrete that’s very dangerous and very precarious. They instead can occupy all of a beautiful area with homes and safety and they can live out their lives in peace and harmony instead of having to go back and do it again.
The US will take over the Gaza Strip and we will do a job with it too. We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out. Create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area … do a real job, do something different.
Just can’t go back. If you go back, it’s going to end up the same way it has for 100 years. I’m hopeful that this ceasefire could be the beginning of a larger and more enduring peace that will end the bloodshed and killing once and for all. With the same goal in mind, my administration has been moving quickly to restore trust in the alliance and rebuild American strength throughout the region and we’ve really done that.
I ended the last administration’s de facto arms embargo on over $1bn, in military assistance for Israel. And I’m also pleased to announce that this afternoon, the United States withdrew from the anti-Semitic UN Human Rights Council and ended all of the support for the UN Relief and Works Agency, which funnelled money to Hamas, and which was very disloyal to humanity.
Trump’s bulldozer approach to Gaza is a common tactic used by the United States. Remember when the first Europeans landed on the shores of what is now the eastern United States? Who met them there? Indigenous people. This was their land; their home. Did we respect their geographical boundaries and property rights? Of course not, silly boy. We are a nation divinely chosen by God; a brightly lit city on a hill. We used proverbial bulldozers and destroyed countless indigenous cultures and communities. From sea to shining sea, our forefathers claimed land for their own that belonged to others, killing anyone who got in their way. Learning nothing over the past 400 years, the United States continues to use threats of economic strangulation, violence, and death to force countries to do what they want them to do. Trump has been in office all of three weeks, yet he has already threatened to invade Panama, turn Canada into an American state, appropriate Greenland, and attack Mexican drug cartels. From tariffs to military threats, Trump intends to get his way even if it means destroying our economy and killing scores of people.
Elections have consequences. What do we do now? We either fight back or give up. We are quickly learning that many corporations who promoted DEI values only did so because it made them look good or benefitted their bottom line. Now that Trump is in office, many companies are doing away with their DEI programs, embracing Trump’s racist bigotry. Gone are courage and conviction. Where are CEOs and political leaders willing to stand up to Trump, even if it costs them financially or politically? Is no one willing to stand up to Trump and the MAGA horde? Have we given up, convincing ourselves that there’s no hope? And maybe there’s not. Maybe Trump 2024 is the gasping breath of a dying republic. Does this mean we give up? I know I can’t, even though I have been quite depressed over the past three weeks, and I suspect Trump still has a lot more harm he intends to inflict on the American people. Do we just give in? If we can’t beat them, join them?
To my progressive readers, what do we do going forward? Is our political system broken beyond repair? Voting doesn’t seem to matter much these days. We routinely elect people who say all the right things when running for office, but once elected these very same people develop amnesia, serving not their constituents, but corporate overlords. I used to disparage people who didn’t vote, but I’m beginning to understand why they don’t. Vote, don’t vote, money buys elections. Rare is the politician who has courage and conviction. This past election, I watched both Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown and Representative Marcy Kaptur morph into quasi-Republican-sounding politicians hoping to win Republicans to their side. I found their mealy-mouth cowardice disgusting. Better to lose standing courageously on your convictions, than lying just to get elected.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
1. There is no such thing as settled law. There is law Trump and the broader right accept, and law that they don’t accept, and everything in the latter category will be relentlessly challenged.
2. There is no such thing as independence within the government. There is only loyalty to Trump and the cause.
3. Diversity is poison. It’s the job of the federal government not merely to arrest its progress where it is but to push it back, aggressively.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Ohio lawmakers are preparing to introduce the “Contraception Begins at Erection Act,” which would make it illegal for men to have sex without trying to create a child.
Two Ohio representatives, Anita Somani and Tristan Rader, posted a video to Bluesky detailing their plan regarding the bill, which was first introduced in Mississippi by Senator Bradford Blackmon.
“Fair is fair, right?” Somani said in the video. “If this legislature is so dedicated to regulating women’s bodies and their access to contraceptives and abortion care then let’s start policing men in the same way. After all, it does take two to tango, right?”
“Our bill would make it illegal to discharge semen or genetic material without the intent to fertilize an embryo,” she continued.
“If you find the language [in the bill] to be absurd, then maybe you should find any bill attempting to restrict reproductive freedoms absurd as well,” Rader chimed in.
According to WTRF, the bill is expected to make clear exceptions for contraceptives, masturbation, and LGBTQIA people.
The penalties for illegally discharging genetic material would be:
$1,000 for the first offense
$5,000 for the second offense
$10,000 for any subsequent offense
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Think of all the people currently living on Earth—approximately eight billion people. Most of them subscribe to some sort of religion, worshipping any one or more of the deities humans have worshipped throughout history. I, too, was born into a devoutly religious family. From the time I was a preschooler to age fifty, I devoted my life to and worshipped the Evangelical God—especially from the age of fifteen forward. At fifteen, I had an experience that is common among Evangelicals. Most of the churches I attended/pastored were Baptist congregations. Making a personal decision to get “saved” was essential to becoming a Christian and church member. While Baptists raised in the church typically make salvation decisions as children, most have subsequent experiences during their teen years. I trace my Christian faith back to an Al Lacy revival meeting in 1972. My parents had divorced earlier that year, and while my parents/siblings stopped attending church, I immersed myself in the machinations of Trinity Baptist Church, attending services every time the doors were open. Trinity provided me with a loving home and a family, and amid my troubled life, the Holy Spirit came to the pew I was sitting on that fall night, convicted me of my sin, and brought me to saving faith in Jesus. From that moment forward, I was a born-again Christian — sins forgiven, Heaven bound, praise Jesus!
Two weeks later, I stood before the church and confessed that God was calling me to be a preacher. In the fall of 1976, four years after getting saved, I enrolled for classes at Midwestern Baptist College in Pontiac, Michigan — a school known for training Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) pastors. While at Midwestern, I met the love of my life. Marriage and an unplanned pregnancy interrupted my college plans. After three years at Midwestern, my partner, Polly, and I packed our meager belongings into a small U-haul trailer and the backseat of a white 1969 Chevrolet Impala, and moved to Bryan, Ohio — the place of my birth, five miles from where we live today.
Several weeks after we moved to Bryan, I was asked by Jay Stuckey, pastor of Montpelier Baptist Church, to be his assistant — an unpaid position focused on improving/expanding the church’s bus ministry and evangelization efforts. We left Montpelier Baptist after seven months, moving to Newark, Ohio — the home of Polly’s parents. After spending two and a half years working with Polly’s father at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Buckeye Lake, I struck out on my own, starting a new Baptist church in Somerset. I would later pastor churches in San Antonio, Texas, Alvordton, Ohio, West Unity, Ohio, and Clare, Michigan. All told, I spent 20,000 hours reading and studying the Bible, preaching over 4,000 sermons, and winning hundreds of people to Christ.
While I would never say that I know everything there is to know about the Bible, I am conversant in all things Bible — especially from a Protestant/Evangelical perspective. I find it amusing when Evangelicals assume that my “problem” is that I don’t understand the Bible; that if I just read certain Bible verses and books or listened to the sermons of this or that preacher, I would see the light and return to the one true faith. And when I say I have already done those things, I am oft accused of lying or being disingenuous. In other words “If you don’t agree with me, you are a liar.”
Evangelicals generally believe that understanding the Bible requires God, the Holy Spirit, living inside of you as your teacher and guide. Without the indwelling of the Spirit, you cannot understand the Bible. Thus, whatever knowledge I may have had as a college-trained Baptist preacher, I am now ignorant of what the Bible teaches; I’m every bit as ignorant as someone who has never, ever read or studied the Bible/Christianity. In no other setting except Evangelicalism does such thinking carry any weight. I know what I know. Just because I am no longer a Christian doesn’t mean I am ignorant about the Bible.
I frequently receive books, tracts, and other printed/recorded Evangelical material from people who are certain that if I just listened to or read what they sent me I would immediately fall on my knees, repent of my sins, and come to or return to (depending on their soteriological beliefs) saving faith. Yesterday, I received a tract in the mail from a local Southern Baptist. No church/individual name was printed on the tract, but the sender wrote “you are loved” with a smiley face on the back of the tract.
The tract was typical of such evangelistic tools. Published by the North American Mission Board (NAMB), the tract presented a shallow, superficial, truncated gospel that, according to the author of the tract, would save me from my sins and guarantee me a home in Heaven after I die. At the back of the tract was a form for me to sign if I prayed the sinner’s prayer, letting the person/church who sent me the tract know that they could put another notch on their gospel six shooters — another sinner “killed” by the Southern Baptist perversion of the Christian gospel.
Several months ago, I received a short book published by an Evangelical preacher named Peter C. English. English wanted to educate me about where I could find the inerrant, infallible Word of God; that there was one English language Bible that was direct from the mouth of God. I am sure some of you are thinking, “King James-only, right?” Yep, but not just KJVO alone. English believes a particular King James translation is THE Word of God — “the Pure Cambridge Version of the King James Bible.” According to the Pure Cambridge website, this Bible is:
By the term Pure Cambridge Text, I refer to a perfect King James Bible as it was printed between the end of WWI and until 1985, but is now being printed by Church Bible Publishers. If you were to look at the English Bible on a pulpit in heaven, it would match exactly. Every word, every letter, every punctuation mark, every verse marking, every italicization, and every subscript and title would be exactly what God the Father thinks of when he considers the English Bible.
I also had a member of First Baptist Church in Bryan, Ohio recently drop a tract on my doorstep. Titled “The Romans Road,” the tract presents yet another shallow, superficial, truncated gospel, one sure to save me if I would just “believe.” Here’s the thing, I used to attend First Baptist in the 1970s. I am well known to the church, so it is unlikely that the person leaving the tract didn’t know who I was. I watched the woman on our RING doorbell camera as she knocked on the door, and not getting an answer, tried to stick the tract in the space between the door and frame. Unable to do so, she huffed and sighed, dropping the track on the stoop in front of the door. Off she went, thinking her littering did its job — saving the notorious atheist Bruce Gerencser.
What do these evangelizers hope to accomplish with their books and tracts? Surely they can’t think that I will be won over to their side by reading second-grade religious material? Not going to happen. I know all I need to know about God/Bible/Christianity. I can’t imagine a theological or philosophical argument I would find persuasive. Maybe, but it’s been many years since I have heard an original, compelling argument for Christianity. All I seem to get from Evangelicals are the same worn-out arguments I have heard my entire life.
To Evangelicals, I say, please don’t waste your time sending me books, pamphlets and tracts. They are not helpful, and I see them as nothing more than reminders of how shallow Evangelical theology really is. You might think that the Holy Spirit will use the words on the printed page to prick my conscience, but, so far, the score is Bruce — 1,000,000 Holy Spirit– 0. You might want to think of more effective ways to evangelize Evangelical-preachers-turned-atheists.
How about you? When was the last time you heard a compelling argument for God from an Evangelical apologist? Please share your experiences in the comment section.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Recently, I received an email from an Evangelical preacher named Mike. What follows is my response to him.
I am so sorry you have lost your faith and pray that you can reconcile your unbelief with the truth of God’s word.
Why feel sorry for me? I left Christianity with my eyes wide open. All of us must come to terms with the notion of God and the teachings of the Bible (as interpreted by countless Christian sects). I have thoroughly and comprehensively weighed Christianity in the balance and found it wanting. Do you expect me to believe contrary to what I know is true? Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind, the Bible says, and that’s what I have done. Do you have evidence that suggests that my conclusions about God, the Bible, and Christianity are wrong? If so, why didn’t you provide me with answers for the hope that lies within you, as the Bible commands you to do?
If you have empirical evidence for the existence of your peculiar deity, please provide it—not Bible verses, not personal testimony, but actual verifiable evidence. If not, all you have is your personal opinion, one rooted in faith and experience. While that may work for you, you can’t expect it to work for me. Personal revelation is, by nature, personal to the individual, so what Jesus has done for you is immaterial. Jesus allegedly does all sorts of things for believers that both of us would agree is either wrong or bat shit crazy. We shouldn’t take any believer’s word for “truth,” unless they can justify and prove their claims.
The scriptural truth is that God’s grace never leads to a “get out of jail(hell) free” license to sin. It is meant to bring about a desire to obey and live righteously out of love for Christ and what he has done for you. A desire to please the one who bought for YOU eternal life with the Father.
According to you. Scores of other Christians believe differently; that salvation is by grace through faith, and not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. These believers certainly desire to live Godly, holy lives, but they still sin. Are they unsaved if they sin again? How many sins does it take for a Christian to lose their faith? Most Christians I know want to live God-honoring lives, but they are, after all, human.
And there are some Christians, antinomians, to be exact, who think that the more they sin the more the grace of God abounds. How can any of us know which way is right? You would think, on such an important matter, that God would have been clear. That he wasn’t suggests that God doesn’t care one way or the other or the Bible is a human book, and not the Word of God.
It doesn’t mean total sinless perfection in this life. We continue to battle the flesh as long as we are alive in these corruptible bodies. Sanctification means we should no longer be comfortable living in sin and have a desire to rid ourselves of the sins that have held us hostage in the past.
The Bible commands Christians to be sinless; to be perfect, even as their Father in Heaven is perfect. The battle you speak of is made up. I understand your theology, but I see no evidence for the notion that humans have souls/spirits. We are fleshly, material beings. The notion of “sin” is a religious construct, one used to elicit fear of judgment, death, and Hell. Isn’t it amazing that religion conjures up the idea of sin and then sells the fearful the antidote — salvation in Jesus Christ?
I am not a sinner. On any given day, I do good and bad things. Most of what I do is neither good or bad — it just is. I made spaghetti for dinner tonight. Pretty good stuff. There was no moral quality to my work. I cooked dinner because I told my partner I would do so. I enjoy cooking, so making dinner was not a burden — though washing dishes was no fun. When a behavior of mine rises to the occasion of being “bad” — that which causes harm to others — I do my best to admit culpability and make restitution. No God, no prayers, just making things right with the person I harmed. I find this preferable to the notion that when I act badly towards my partner, family, or neighbor, I am actually “sinning” against God. Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) evangelist John R. Rice once said that Christians should keep their sin lists short; that believers should confess their transgressions as soon as they are committed — pray without ceasing. And that’s exactly what I do — sans God. So far, today, I have not caused harm to someone else, so I have no “sins” to confess. Can you say the same for yourself, or do you continue to sin in thought, word, and deed — sins of commission and omission?
Are you suggesting that I am, in some way, in bondage to “sin?” Do tell. I am sure you are having a hard time understanding why people like me don’t need your God, Jesus, Bible, or Christianity. We are fine just the way we are. I have a good life, a wonderful life, in fact. Yes, I have a lot of health problems and live with debilitating chronic pain. I suffer every day. That said, life is still good. I have been married for forty-six years. We are blessed to have six children and their spouses, sixteen grandchildren, and four cats. We have a comfortable home and a nice car. Life has certainly been challenging for us, but, on balance, we are grateful to have the life we do. I can’t think of any way our life would be better with God outside of not burning in Hell after we die (a claim we don’t believe is true.)
Saved by Reason,
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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God created everything. Jesus is the Great Physician. God answers prayer. If we pray to the Great Physician, he will heal us. Or so Christians say, anyway.
Yet, when sickness and disease come their way, what do Christians do? They seek out medical care from physicians, specialists, and hospitals. When someone has a heart attack, what does he or his family do? Does he call for the elders of the church to anoint him with oil and pray over him so he will be healed? Of course not. He either dials 9-1-1 or has a family member take them to the emergency room. No time for prayer. Death is knocking on the door and the only hope lies not in Jesus’ blood and righteousness, but in the skills of medical professionals.
An anonymous YouTube commenter said, No Christian has ever had a heart attack and said, “Quick, get me to the church.”
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
I have been blogging since 2007. When I started, I was still a Christian — barely. A year or so later, I finally admitted I was no longer a believer. This iteration of my blog went live in December 2014, over ten years ago. Over the years, millions of people have stopped by to read one or more pages on this site. Many readers are one-and-done. They read a few posts, get what they need, and move on, never to stop by again. Others become regular readers of this site, even if they don’t comment or email me. And then some are devoted readers; people who regularly comment on posts that interest them.
Lurkers are likely the largest groups of readers. I am encouraged when lurkers comment or email me, often saying that they have been reading my writing for years. Oftentimes, when I feel like throwing in the towel, I will get an email from a lurker thanking me for something I’ve written or sharing with me how my posts helped them “see the light.”
As I rework and repost old writing, I look at the comments to see who commented on the original post. Without fail, I find commenters who, at one time, were regular participants on this site, but no longer are. I wonder, What happened? Did I piss them off? Did they die? Did they return to the faith? Did they get what they needed from my writing, and move on? Did my political writing upset them? Did my writing become boring to them, or too repetitious?
While I would like every reader to stay with me until death do us part, I know that’s not how the Internet works. The goal, then, is to retain as many readers as possible, knowing that most readers will move in, out, and through this site. I am grateful for everyone who reads my writing, even if they disagree with me, are still Evangelical Christians, or voted for Donald Trump. The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser is a safe place for discussion for everyone, Christian or not. Yes, I have a comment policy, but everyone is given at least one opportunity to say whatever it is they want to say. If a commenter shows he or she can play well with others, they will be encouraged to continue commenting. Some people will frequently comment and then suddenly stop. I always wonder why they stopped commenting. Did I upset them? Did another commenter upset them? Did they say all they intended to say?
None of this troubles me much except for those who stopped reading because I upset them for some reason. I always want to know if something I’ve written upsets someone. Why? Sometimes, people get upset because I was not precise and they misunderstood me. I ALWAYS want to be understood. That’s why I hope people who are upset by something I wrote will contact me so I can clarify what I said — if possible. Sometimes, there’s no imprecision on my part. I do my best to say what I mean to say, so I don’t have to explain or apologize later. I am a plain-spoken writer, and I try to write in a way that everyone understands. Disagreements happen. When they do happen, I appreciate the opportunity, if possible, to clear the disagreement up. There will, of course, always be times when no amount of explanation and dialog will fix a disagreement. Sometimes, disagreements become so sharp that people (usually atheists) feel the need to “break fellowship” with me. Much like getting a divorce, this is their way of showing their disapproval of something I have written or said. These folks rarely return, though sometimes they lurk in the shadows, reading but not commenting. Such disagreements are rare, but they happen.
I know I am a niche blogger, a writer who focuses on Evangelicalism — particularly the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) church movement. Sure, I write on other topics, but I make sure I stay true to my calling. 🙂 I often wonder if I’ll reach a point in my writing where there’s nothing new or meaningful to say or if my words no longer are helpful, and it is time to hang up my spurs. With 1, 600 posts in my draft file, I’m certain I have enough fodder to last a long while.
Are there things you think I can do to improve reader engagement and encourage commenting? Please share your erudite thoughts in the comment section.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Within months, the COVID-19 pandemic hit the U.S. It’s only gotten so much worse.
For the remainder of 2020, we dealt with 385,676 deaths from the disease while then-President Trump lived in denial and misled the American people every day. He lied about its danger, how long it would last, treatments and prevention. He would bring in medical experts to speak during White House press conferences and then make stuff up himself out of nowhere and undermine everything that they said.
It was horrifying. People were dying and losing loved ones and the president was spewing an endless stream of strange nonsense, drivel, and dangerous misinformation. Many millions of people believed everything he said without question.
Then Trump lost the 2020 Election. He began lying about that too. Millions believed him again. Coward politicians rolled over for him. His lies exploded in the historic Jan. 6 attack on our nation’s Capitol.
As the COVID-19 vaccine was rolled out to the public at-large in 2021, the anti-vaxxer movement went into overdrive. Currently vaccine hesitancy is near record highs, so the anti-vaxxer movement really made out, a grisly and telling cultural consequence of a pandemic that’s taken 1.2 million American lives.
Regardless, objectively, the covid vaccine was a man-made miracle. Plagues throughout history have lasted up to 20 years or more. We had a vaccine in 11 months thanks to the brilliance of scientific research and modern medicine. It was incredible. It was a tremendous accomplishment of humankind by every historical standard, and people threw the most outrageous temper tantrums over it.
It’s easy to get lost in modern comfort, but I wish more people would just take a few seconds sometimes to recognize that we live in extraordinary times. The fact that we get to take hot showers every day is a monumental luxury compared to the rest of human history.
That we can communicate across the globe instantaneously is anthropologically astounding, if you compare the last 30 years of human history to the 300,000 years before it.
Look around you right now, wherever you are: desks, tables, electronics, electricity, light bulbs, appliances, glassware, furniture, knick-knacks, artwork, paint, carpeting, buildings. All of those things require science, engineering, mathematics, chemistry, physics, logistics, expertise. Experts. Smart people. Smart people gave us all of this.
Intelligence gave us every amazing thing that we see around us and take for granted. The collective education of humankind over millennia has brought us here.
A whole galaxy of humans and human know-how has come together to give us these wild luxuries of daily existence that make the vast majority of us wealthier in health and technology and everyday human comfort than the richest kings and queens and emperors of history.
And yet. We sneer at experts. We spit epithets like “academic elites” at professors dedicating their lives to pursuing discovery that benefits humankind. And we worship flashy internet hucksters selling lifestyle scams.
We mock intelligence and glorify egomania and materialism. We crave spectacle and are voyeurs for anger, confrontation, and violence.
We live in fantasy worlds where what we want to believe is true regardless of whether it is true, because what we want comes first no matter what, certainly no matter any facts, this decadence of mind and body only afforded to us by modernity’s remarkable luxury and technology.
It is in these ways that I regard a very great many adults as simply overgrown children.
Speaking of which, five years later, Donald Trump is president again. He has pardoned the 1,500 rioters who sacked the United States Congress to try to overthrow the last election for him.
Trump’s cancellation of NIH grant review panels, as Forbes reports, includes the $7.1 billion annual budget for the National Cancer Institute: “of which more than $3 billion a year is allocated directly towards research for the diagnosis, prevention and treatment of cancer, which causes over 600,000 deaths in the U.S. every year.” The NCI supports 72 different cancer centers.
Freezing national funding for cancer research is sadistic.
It could also be devastating to America’s institutions of higher education.
In Ohio, Republican politicians are piling on. This week they reintroduced a proposal to overhaul education at our colleges and universities.
They seek to install a culture of fear and paranoia over subject matter among Ohio faculty, threatening their livelihoods and banning their ability to strike. They also seek to ban any diversity efforts on campuses as well as any diversity courses.
The clear intent of the bill is to have a chilling effect on freedom of speech and expression, both explicit and implicit, which is an atrocious insult to the entire purpose of education and all of the ideas behind open inquiry in the pursuit of knowledge.
Ohio higher education currently ranks No. 39 in America. Apparently that’s not bad enough for them.
America’s love affair with swaggering ignorance and confident stupidity continues to reach awful new heights. The bill will come due. The piper will need to be paid. The damage will be extensive.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
