"Oh, my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, And I detest all my sins, Because of the loss of heaven And the pains of hell, But most of all because I have offended Thee,"
Sometimes it takes a fictional priest (I think it was the priest) to smack your brain and remind you why you're supposed to behave.
I grew up Seventh Day Adventist. (Don't worry, I still love haystacks. I'm not entirely lost.)
For quite some time, I hated going to church. I hated dressing up. I still don't like dressing up...maybe I am lost.
I disliked church because it was a trip into the house of Rules, Behavior and Guilt. If you didn't dress up, and enjoy it, it meant you didn't like giving your best to God. And if you didn't like giving your best to God...well, what's that say about you?
You know you're not supposed to eat meat, drink caffeine or do anything on the Sabbath that might make you think of smiling (unless of course it's a nature walk). And once you know you're not supposed to enjoy anything on the Sabbath, you better not enjoy anything. Because if you do...well, what's that say about you?
Then certain pastors were hired who fixed all that. Then they were fired. Weird, huh?
By the time I was in college I was no longer Adventists. But my Astronomy 101/102 professor was. He had the green and red bound Ellen White Bible Commentary series in his office.
We spoke about religion for a bit and discussed what I was mentioning above.
In the end, he basically said, "We obey because we love God."
Not from fear of hell fire or the thought of paradise. But because we love. That's the reason we should strive to be good little boys and girls. Because we all know, when we love someone, we want to do right by them. And when we mess up, it doesn't mean we don't love them anymore, it means we messed up <-- What a freeing thought that?
So when a fictional priest cries out that the biggest reason he regrets his sins is because it offended the God he loves...well, what's that say about him?
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