by Zoey Dalan ~ I t's almost always the small things that make you question reality. The big things are covered and denounced, over and over, explained away by everyone you know. What'll trip you up is the small things that don't quite make sense, the details that don't fit in. And sometimes, it's not until you are deeply involved in that reality that you question its nature. Ironically, I didn't doubt a word they told me until I was set to be an official member of the church. As a child, I was raised in the Methodist church. My family was involved everywhere. My sister and I were two of half a dozen kids in the church at any one time. Both our parents were in the choir. My dad taught Sunday school for the high-schoolers. And every step of the way, as God was shown to me, I never wondered if He actually existed. I wasn't worried about His existence. I was just trying to be the best Christian I could be. Christianity was like brushing your teeth. The

By James Wilhelm ~ F or so many people life is significantly stressful. Many problems we have are because of how we were brought up. Most were never shown how to handle the problems life gives us. The result is we respond in ways not good for us and not in our interest. We all do it to some degree. If only were given the guidance we needed when we were growing up. Most of us needed to be shown how to be stable - how to react appropriately to things when we were children and young adults. The result is we bring trouble on ourselves without even recognizing it. Have you ever noticed the bad choices so many Christians make? Even with God on their side? Churches are full of people praying to God for solutions to self-inflected problems. They would be better served by learning how to make better choices and decisions than pushing a belief in something as tenuous as religion. When you know things are not working out and you look to God for help – I’ve rarely met a relig

By Carl S ~ Article originally published on 12.19.2019 in the author's local newspaper. E very December, clergy take center-stage. Every time they preach of Jesus, I'm reminded of a fact: any man who does not write down his own thoughts and words gives up control of what is attributed to him after he has died. In the case of Jesus, this seems to be puzzling, since, as a rabbi, he was literate, and had at least more than 20 years available in which to write before he began his mission. There are various gospels, all by unknown authors, written decades after he died. From them, early Church bishops chose merely four. We are presented with only what those men allege Jesus said and did. Some people claim their words are fake news of the times, and there is no way to deny this. What we're told to take on faith means to believe and trust hearsay, handed down by those writers and their echoers. This tradition has created terrible problems for mankind; any faith of exclusion