Changing God

What does it mean? Everyone seems to disagree,

   Believing theirs is the only true deity.

Men with too much money run for office with

   A platform based on a 2000 year old myth.

The offense is intentional because you offend me

   When you quote Leviticus hypocritically.

Sometimes it’s a justification for hate,

   Being cruel is the ticket to heaven’s gate.

Sometimes it inspires when people’s lives are bleak,

   A crutch for those who hope and seek

For a life that is better than the one they’re in now

   But something gets twisted and then they allow

Their children to kill themselves over a verse

   That says death is preferable to the backwards heart curse.

Israel-Palestine, India-Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran,

   9/11, Westboro, Holocaust, Gandhi, man hating man killing man.

Yet in spite of the bloodshed,

   The scripture lives on and when the dead

Pile up at a deity’s door,

   They’re asked why they aren’t alive anymore.

Religion justifies the whole bloody business, Jews

   To queers to coloreds, i.e., god’s human refuse.

Don’t question why they’re hated for being born a different way

   That’s not in the scriptures and it may

Lead to a whole slew of other questions for which we’re not

  Prepared. Don’t encourage rational thought.

The holy readers protest now, we’re not all the same.

   Correct, but it’s the hateful who speak in your name.

Resolve to make changes. Resolve to make peace.

   Love thy neighbor like Jesus pleaded. Let the hate cease.

Redefine religion as a power for the good. Teach

   Universal equality. Practice what you preach.

Stop killing your children with harsh words of sin.

   The world, now more than ever, needs love to begin.

Are we not all god’s children, the strong and the weak,

   The oppressed and oppressor, the bold and the meek?