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A Better God (Free verse) by Dovina

When I become god of a far away planet, I’ll set up my world with great beauty and wit. And to keep me from getting too lonely, I’ll make beings to admire my work. My creatures will discover all that I’ve made quite pleasing and right in their finite minds. I’ll show them in love how their world was formed, remove any doubt of who did it or why. Ancient texts on how I created, I’ll not leave about to conflict with evidence for some other way. No, I’ll make plain how to seek me and praise, if they wish to, but never they must. Then they will let me receive them and heal their self-made diseases. That’s the kind of god I will be. Not the unknowable elusive kind.

zodiac 7-Nov-04/12:50 AM
The way I see it, whichever you pick you have to believe God - the real God - isn't really perfect.

For a), you'd have a rough time claiming your planet was better than the real God's, since he'd just say, "How can it be? I'm perfect and you're not. If you don't understand how I run my planet, maybe that's BECAUSE YOU'RE NOT PERFECT." And it's true: without perfection, you stand the big chance of your planet being a colossal mistake.

If you picked b), you're screwed already, since being perfect would make you exactly like the current God (assuming he's perfect), and you'd have to decide to make a planet exactly like he did.

And I can't go in for c). It just makes the word "perfect" kind of trash and trampy, while I believe in real (or at least some abstract notion of) perfection. I mean, if you're going to make up a word like "perfect" and make it mean something like "completely suited for a particular purpose or situation," or its even stricter (maybe) religious sense, then there's not much good in fucking around with it.

In short, it's probably easy for you to believe in a God who's not perfect, since you don't seem to really believe in God anyway. But for a poem that presumes a (probably Christian) God right off the bat, even ironically, that seems kind of dumb. The way I see it, you kind of have to accept that if there's a God, or at least the Christian one, he's perfect. That's part of His definition.




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