What does it say about us?

Today is Presidents day here in the US. We are taking the time between what most people agree are the two greatest presidents birthdays, to honor all Presidents with a sale and no mail delivery. (Well at least someone gets a day off). There has been much ado about Abraham Lincoln this year with his 200th Birthday last week, and depending on whose rating you look at both he and Washington are either one or two. The rest there is some variation with the exception of our 9th president, William Henry Harrison, who served exactly one month in office before dying from pneumonia probably contracted from delivering the longest inaugural speech ever on a very cold day without a coat, but I digress.

I read somewhere about a year ago a statement that stuck with me that any attempt to rate the presidents of the past really says more about us today than it does about them. We will judge them based on our standards and our ability to see the longer term results of their actions. The most recent examples are Harry Truman who was so unpopular when he left office, he got booed in his home state of Missouri, but now is revered as one of our better presidents. Still when we rate them, we tend to show more about where we are as a society today, than the decisions that they made which have helped shape society for better or for worse.

Where am I going with this? Bill Maher's movie "Religulous" comes out on DVD this week. I made a comment to my wife that I never went to see it. But now that it's out we should rent it. She made a comment asking "why all you will do is get mad." Well I might. I have been a loyal viewer of his show Real Time and generally agree with most of where he is coming from, but of course when it comes to religion, we part company. However, misplaced his ire towards religion is, I do think that it says something as a whole about "us". The church even when it has made mistakes has never fully admitted them. There has been a push in the US from the religious right to turn back the progress of science, and the arts, as well as human rights. I sometimes wonder myself if certain individuals have read the Bible they claim to uphold. But when we say nothing in response, it says a lot about us as well.

Mr. Maher's vehemnt denial of religion, to me says that he has been spiritually abused in the past, very deeply I presume, to which no one has ever appologized for. Now communication is a two way street and he must be willing to listen to those of us who say, no that type of faithdoes not speak for all of us. But we also must be proactive, and be willing to take steps that show what true faith and religion is all about. Jesus had a lot to say about serving the poor, the outcast, feeding the hungry, healing the sick, and standing up to the powers that be and saying they did not speak for God. If we do not do so as well, what will that say to more people like Bill Maher? And what does that say about us?