The Trouble with God Read online

  By the time God sent Gabriel down to inform Mary about what was going to happen to her, he had known exactly what he wanted his angel to say. “First of all, tell Mary how incredibly lucky she is—blessed, use the word blessed—that I have chosen her. (NT, Lu. 1:28) After that, she may be unsure, or even troubled. Tell her not to be frightened, Gabriel. Tell her that I, God, really like her. Tell her that I intend to fill her womb with a baby whom she will name ‘Jesus.’ Tell her that Jesus will be great and that he will rule over my people, you know, basically forever.” (NT, Lu. 1:31)

  “If Mary asks how this is going to happen,” God had continued, “given that she is a virgin—because she is definitely a virgin, Gabriel, even though she is married, she is a married virgin, because they are quite common, it turns out—anyway, as I was saying, if she asks how this will happen, given her virginity, tell her that I will come upon her!” (NT, Lu. 1:35)

  “Correction, Gabriel,” God had then said. “I do not intend to ‘come upon’ Mary, as that would be defeating my purpose, quite obviously. Tell her that … yes, this is very good … tell her that ‘the power of the Highest’ (and make sure that she understands that ‘Highest’ is capitalized if at all possible) shall overshadow her.” God had hesitated once again at this point. “Does that sound ‘rapey,’ Gabriel?” God had asked, then quickly answered his own question. “Of course it doesn’t. It sounds forceful—confident. I am God the Highest and I will overcome her with my power, yes, that’s magnificent, say that. (Also, and this isn’t that important, Gabriel, but if you get a chance, please ask Mary whether she and her sister are both named Mary. Because if they are … well, it’s highly unimaginative of their parents, that’s all I can say!”) (NT, Jo. 19:25)

  As God waited for what he called the “Big Night” to arrive, he found himself beginning to imagine what it would be like to actually have Mary as his girlfriend. “Maybe I wouldn’t need the love of all mankind,” he mused. “Maybe her love could heal me. I’m actually beginning to consider the possibility that it could!” (Of course it goes without saying that deep inside God had known that things wouldn’t go this way; that Mary wouldn’t love or comfort him; that she wouldn’t make him feel better at all; that she would, in fact, make him feel much, much worse.)

  By the time God, dressed in his finest white robe, hair and beard neatly brushed, had been flying down to meet Mary, one thing had become undeniable: He was extremely nervous. What if things didn’t go well, God had wondered? He had never been particularly good at this sort of thing: small-talk, flirtation, whatever you wanted to call it. Frankly, he was awkward, lacking in social skills. Also, God suddenly wondered, why had he made himself an old man anyway, rather than, say, a twenty-five-year-old? (The answer to that one turned out to be obvious. Because old men were the very best thing to be, that’s why!)

  Entering Mary’s room, God suddenly felt—there is no other word for it—terrified. He stood there in the doorway for a long moment before slowly crossing to Mary’s small bed. God later remembered feeling flushed as he sat down. He and Mary sat together on her bed for several long, uncomfortable minutes. God stared silently at Mary, then looked away. She gazed at the floor. A candle flickered, a donkey milled around outside, some insects buzzed.

  Then Mary closed her eyes, took a deep breath and lay back on the bed. God gazed down at her. “It’s time,” he thought to himself.

  A few moments later and … well, it was actually happening … and God felt … amazed. “This is wonderful,” he thought to himself. “This is … sublime.”

  Mary was so beautiful … the sweet smell of her … the soft feel of her … her delicate skin and her sweet face and her feminine body and yes … oh yes … to be touched by her.

  “She feels me,” God realized with a start. “She feels me.” It was at that moment that God began to feel extremely self-conscious. He began to smell himself … hear himself … feel himself.

  “Stop it,” God quickly thought. “Stop thinking these awful, negative thoughts.” But God discovered to his horror that it was, in fact, quite difficult to stop thinking such thoughts.

  Now Mary had become aware of what was happening to God. Moment by moment, things were, how to say this, deflating for him.

  “Think of something else, think of something exciting, you fool,” God had demanded of himself. But his mind was filled with dark thoughts now, like a young, vulnerable animal surrounded by a swarm of biting insects.

  God struggled manfully to make things work. But second by second, things got worse and worse until, before long, everything ended in shriveled, shrunken defeat.

  God sat on the edge of Mary’s bed, his back to her, deeply embarrassed. He couldn’t think of anything to say. “I’m sorry” is what he wanted to say. “I’m sorry, Mary.” But he didn’t say that because, well, it wouldn’t have made any sense; he was God, what did he have to be sorry for? Nothing at all. Instead, he got up and without a word walked outside. He stood for a moment in the darkness, then raised his arms over his head and flew back up to heaven.

  The following night God sent Gabriel back down to Earth with, more or less, a turkey baster, and the deed was done. (It was actually much nicer than a turkey baster, if you must know; it was actually more like a wineskin, really, quite handsome in its own way—not like a turkey baster at all, in fact. As for the production of the seed itself, it was none of anyone’s business what God thought about, nor did he feel the slightest bit of shame about it.)

  In God’s mind, there had been one unambiguously positive aspect of his failed relationship with Mary: Once he had laid eyes on her, he had stopped talking about penises and balls entirely. “I didn’t even mention them in my second book,” he later marveled to himself. “Why, I didn’t even seem to care if men trimmed their penises anymore! I made my whole deal with Abraham contingent upon foreskins (OT, Gen. 17:10) and now I didn’t even care! (NT, Gal. 5:6) Or actually I still did, I didn’t like the ‘dog-dick’ look, it was repulsive to me, but I wasn’t going to kill the whole deal just because some men didn’t show off their handsome mushroom heads. That was obviously not the point of this whole thing—the point was much bigger than that! (I still did really like perfect balls, though; nothing could ever change that. And seed, I really liked seed a lot. And women were still repulsive to me. In later books—and yes, obviously there would be later books; I’d never stop trying to reach people, even though I’d never succeed!—women will barely even be present, ha.)”

  CHAPTER SIX

  When Jesus was born, God had wanted there to be a giant celebration of some sort. “I believe I’ll move a star off its natural course!” he had declared. (NT, Mat. 2:9–10) (Which was not that easy to do, incidentally; stars are quite large, it turns out, and this one was several hundred quadrillion miles away from Earth so it took a shit-ton of travel and labor to do it—but hey, it was worth it in the end, it was a sensational effect.) “I will send three wise men to observe Jesus’ birth, which will also be heralded by angels singing!” God had proclaimed. (Sadly, Jesus’ birth-song hadn’t been one of God’s best; it had been kind of dashed-off actually. “Glory to God in the highest blah blah blah,” that kind of boilerplate stuff. [NT, Lu. 2:14] It was a pretty tune, though, vaguely similar to “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” from The Lion King—which was one of God’s favorite movies, as well as one of his favorite Broadway musicals, in case you’re wondering!) (Another one of God’s favorite pastimes: Sumo wrestling. “I love to watch those big boys go at it! Especially knowing how they’re all going to sizzle in hell eternally afterward!”)

  God’s splashy announcement regarding Jesus’ birth had indirectly led to a bunch of children being killed (NT, Mat. 2:16), but by this time, God had definitely learned “not to sweat the small stuff,” as he put it. (“And other than my needs, it’s all small stuff, haha.”) One thing God never quite figured out was why exactly he had announced Jesus’ birth with such fanfare and then basically done nothing for the next thirty years. “It
was like a huge, exciting circus opening, which was then followed by an hour of dead silence,” he occasionally chided himself.

  Sitting on a patch of hard, cold ground now, lazily running his fingers through some dirt, God thinks back to Jesus’ childhood. “Was I an absent parent?” he wonders. “Should I have played more of a role in my son’s life, taught him something maybe?” But God instantly rejects the thought. “First of all, I was extremely busy, and second of all—look, it’s not like Mary was such an outstanding parent either, okay? Taking Jesus into the city, then heading home without him and not until the next day even realizing he was gone? (NT, Lu. 2:43–48) Then taking three days to find him, even though he was probably exactly where she left him? Kind of seemed like Mary wanted to lose that boy,” God mutters under his breath, followed by: “He was kind of a little know-it-all.” (NT, Lu. 2:49)

  When Jesus had turned thirty (“90% of the way through his life,” God remembered bragging to his angels at the time), God had finally set things in motion. Immediately after Jesus had been baptized by John the Baptist, God took the shape of a dove and landed on his son’s shoulder. He then called down from heaven, “This is my beloved son and I am pleased with him.” (NT, Mat. 3:16–17) God had considered having the bird say these words, but he decided they wouldn’t sound as impressive coming out of a dove’s mouth. (If doves could even talk, which they couldn’t obviously, and God certainly wasn’t going to send in a damned parrot. “It would have sounded comical and I wanted it to sound lofty.”)

  “Incidentally,” God had informed Gabriel at the time, “with regard to the silly rumor that is going around (which will, in the end, turn out to be completely true, but never mind that right now) that Jesus was with me in heaven from the very start, well, I think this moment makes it pretty obvious that he wasn’t! I was basically introducing myself to him, alright? ‘Hello, I am a bird possessed by your father, God. You are my son and I am happy with you.’” God hadn’t liked the awkward moment that had occurred after he had spoken to Jesus from heaven. “It looked like he was waiting for me to make a whole speech or something, but that one sentence was all I had prepared. So he just stared blankly at dove-me for a long moment, until I flew away. It wasn’t nearly as overwhelming a moment as I wished it had been.”

  With regard to John the Baptist, by the way, God had loved the guy. God had helped Mary’s barren older sister, Elizabeth, get pregnant with John the Baptist in the first place. (NT, Lu. 1:7) (“Is ‘barren’ an unkind word to describe a woman?” God had once asked himself. “No, it’s exactly right,” he had quickly responded. “It means ‘arid, bleak, and lifeless.’”) John the Baptist (and God always referred to him as “John the Baptist,” by the way, never just “John.” “I sure do like the cut of that John the Baptist’s jib!”) had done all the right things: He had talked incessantly about God; he had demanded that people repent; he had even eaten bugs. (NT, Mat. 3:4) (“Not sure why I liked that so much,” God thinks now, “but I surely did!”) God had also loved it when John the Baptist had told people that they were evil trees who would soon be chopped down and tossed into the fire. (NT, Mat. 3:10) “Nice!” God had cried out loudly. “NICE!” (Jesus, by the way, had later totally stolen this tree-human analogy from John the Baptist and never once given him credit for it—which had been flat-out rude, if you asked God.) (NT, Mat. 7:19) God had been extremely saddened when John the Baptist had his head cut off and placed on a platter. (NT, Mar. 6:27–28) “That’s hideous,” God had seethed, watching. “And if I laughed, it was only out of surprise, because it definitely wasn’t funny!”

  Q: Were there things that Jesus had said and done during his time on Earth that God had liked?

  A: Yes, definitely. Here was one. When Jesus had instructed his followers that “sparrows don’t fall from trees without God doing it,” God had nodded deeply. (NT, Mat. 10:29) “I do make sparrows fall out of trees,” he had thought. “I make their little hearts stop, then watch them topple forward and land with a wee fluttery thud on the ground.” God had been in control of killing all birds, in fact; it had been a surprisingly large part of his job and he had been gratified that Jesus brought it up, because it wasn’t something that he frequently got credit for. “I particularly enjoyed killing parrots,” God speaks aloud. “I always loathed their sarcastic little voices.” God had also enjoyed killing owls. “Hoo hoo,” the owls would ask, and God would smile tightly and whisper, “God, that’s hoo,” and the owls would instantly fall over dead.

  Jesus had also scored some points for himself when he announced that he had come to Earth not in peace, but rather with a sword. (NT, Mat. 10:34) “Splendid!” God had declared upon hearing that. “Why don’t you chop off someone’s head with it then?!” When God had realized that Jesus had been speaking “symbolically,” as was his wont, he had been bitterly disappointed. “Always hated it when he spoke symbolically,” God mutters, absently drawing a cross in the dirt.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  But almost as if he had been trying to annoy God, Jesus had invariably said or done pretty much exactly the wrong thing. Talking so much about the “Holy Ghost,” for instance. (NT, Mat. 12:31–32) What the hell was that about? “There’s no such thing as a Holy Ghost!” God had yelled when he first heard the term. “First of all, I despise ghosts and always have! (OT, Lev. 19:31) Why would I create one? Second of all, who is this ‘Holy Ghost’ supposed to be anyway, some kind of, what?—’invisible presence that fills people’s souls up?’ What an absurdly unprovable idea! And third, ‘Holy Ghost’ is an oxymoron, okay? Like ‘Holy Devil’ or ‘Holy Woman’!” (It also wasn’t even “monotheism,” when you thought about it, God later realized; it was more like pantheism or polytheism or one of those other bullshit-isms that he loathed.) But had Jesus stopped talking about the Holy Ghost? No, he had not. He had kept blabbing about it all the way to the bitter end, in fact. (NT, Mat. 28:18)

  And there was more. Actually having the nerve to tell his followers that all food was clean? (NT, Mar. 7:19) That had made God’s head spin. “You’re telling them that crabs, mice, and bat-birds (OT, Lev. 11:19) are clean to eat?” God had cried in disbelief. “They are not clean to eat, bat-birds are filthy abominations and they always will be!” But Jesus’ off-key remarks had continued: “Stop talking about men cutting their balls off!” God had thundered. (NT, Mat. 19:12) “Stop letting heavily menstruating women touch you!” (NT, Lu. 8:43–48) “And definitely stop adding new commandments! Don’t you think that if I’d wanted humans to ‘love their neighbors,’ I would’ve told Moses that in the first place? (NT, Mat. 22:39) I couldn’t care less if they love their neighbors, I want them to love ME, that’s the point of this whole thing, Jesus, how can you not see that?”

  Then—and this had been a big one—there was the whole healing thing. “I gave Jesus healing ability in order to prove his powers, alright, Gabriel?” God remembered saying. “‘Do it twice, three times maybe, that’ll be more than enough,’ that’s what I told him. I didn’t need hundreds of sick people healed; I mean honestly, why did Jesus think I made so much sickness anyway, because I hated it so much? And once he started healing people, what did he think they were going to want from him? To be cured, that’s what! Also—also—I’d already given mankind the cure to many diseases. Leprosy, for instance! I had made it clear that the cure for leprosy was to drip bird’s blood in a circle outside the leper’s house! (OT, Lev. 14:48–52) So why exactly did Jesus need to cure a disease I’d already cured?”

  “Here’s the thing. Jesus made the whole thing about him,” God had later fumed to Gabriel. “It was all about ‘Jesus and his magical healing powers,’ when what I wanted it to be about was how mad I was and how mankind had better repent because I was just about to end the world! (Which I was, by the way. I simply changed my mind, that’s all.) Think about it, Gabriel. What did Jesus’ followers call themselves? ‘Christ-ians,’ right? Not ‘Lord-ians’ or ‘God-ians’ or ‘Yahweh-ians,’ no, ‘Christ-ians.’ How was I supposed to fe
el about that? I created this whole thing, without me, there is literally, and I mean quite literally, nothing, and they love Jesus more? What did I do to deserve that?”

  Even worse than the healing thing from God’s point of view, much worse in fact, had been Jesus’ misguided decision to bring people back from the dead (not to mention teaching his idiot followers to do it too!) (NT, Mat. 10:7) “Does Jesus not grasp that him returning from the dead is meant to be mind-blowing? Does he not see how much he’s lessening the impact of that moment by doing this? Does he not understand that if people are routinely coming back from the dead, that makes his return no big deal, like, ‘Oh, look, Jesus is back from the dead,’ ‘Yeah, whatever, who cares, I saw three people come back just last week.’”

  “Also,” God thinks to himself, “Lazarus had been dead for four days, alright? FOUR DAYS. (NT, Jo. 11:17) You could smell him in heaven! I mean, fine, he did look funny, I won’t deny that. It did make me laugh seeing this grey-faced zombie-man stumbling around and bumping into things and making weird gurgling noises, and yes, I did call Gabriel over, and yes, we did have tears rolling down our faces as we watched Lazarus trip over a rock and face-plant then jump up and run around in jerky little circles before toppling headfirst into a well. Damn, I’m laughing now just remembering it. Still though, it was definitely a bad idea.”

  Not long after the whole Lazarus flub, Jesus had started boasting about how glorious he was, or soon would be or, you know, whatever. “Who knows what he’s talking about sometimes,” God had snapped. Jesus had then yelled up to God, “Save me and glorify your name!” and God had instantly yelled back, “I have already glorified my name and I will glorify it again!” which he had thought sounded tremendously commanding, even if he hadn’t been 100% sure what it meant. (NT, Jo. 12:28) Jesus had then referred to himself as “the Prince of the world,” which God had found enormously presumptuous. (NT, Jo. 12:31)