There is a good deal of talk about the 'last days' and how we must be living in them. To hear those who expound on this topic, Armageddon is just around the corner (the end of days has been coming for centuries now, with every religion known to Man taking odds on the day and the hour of our demise). The most recent source of urgency seems to stem from the issue of same sex marriage. An august group of moral majority types, bibles in-hand and cloaked in their homemade self-righteousness, speak as if they have a direct connection with God and the burning bush. We are warned that all of us will go the way of damnation if we do not disavow those who would love another person of their own gender.

This pious group is convinced that the issue of gay marriage alone will singlehandedly bring us to total and complete destruction. The fact that gay couples have been productive members of our society for decades, most of whom have been in loving and committed relationships for years and are raising families, does not seem to resonate with our so called pillars of the community.

So much piety exists today, it is the age of the Pharisees; those who pray loud and boastful prayers for all to hear. They march around making harsh and judgmental statements about those they proclaim are unfit to live in our society, as if they have been given some divine right to decide who is and is not worthy of God's love. By virtue of their occupation of church pews and regular contributions to the offering plate, they assume this buys them a place at the right hand of God; to sit in judgment over others.

If they are so full of the personal knowledge of what God wants for us, why is there no love or benevolence emanating from them? There is only venomous moralizing and judging going on, rigid and unyielding rhetoric.

I know there are people of faith in this world who manage to do God's work on a daily basis; they are not the ones dishing out narrow minded edicts. True people of faith are doing their best to be God's emissaries of love and kindness. The majority of them labor in obscurity and ask nothing in return for all the good deeds they do for others. They leave judgment to God and are only interested in serving humanity.

"Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies." - Mother Teresa

While I believe in God and the faithful, I have absolutely no use for organized religions. There is so much hypocrisy in these highly structured orders and, I believe, they interpret the bible to fit their needs rather than to be used as a guide to inspire harmony and unity among people.

What good comes of a belief system when it ostracizes those who dare to differ with it, or when it strives to oppress women, to keep them uneducated and at the mercy of tyrants? Not all religions espouse this kind of oppression of women, but fundamentalist teachings tend to embrace men as the ultimate authority figures. No special wisdom or talent is needed, just that of being male will suffice. The overall view is that women are nothing more than handmaidens. I do not believe that God put women on the earth to be second class citizens and yet that is exactly how they are treated in most theological settings.

It seems to me that organized religions spend a good deal of time setting up rules of exclusion. For example: divorce is something that can get one excommunicated from the Catholic Church and there are a number of mortal sins one must be aware of to avoid eternal damnation.

Most religions are overly burdensome with a litany of dos and don'ts if one wants to belong. Most seem to create more discord through intractable ideology than anything else.

"If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other." - Mother Teresa

As humans we tend to make things much more complicated than they need to be. We analyze that which does not need analyzing. To simply be open to one another and willing to extend a hand of friendship is the first step in regaining our humanity. Getting beyond our biases and pettiness and truly attempting to know another person, and embracing them for who they are, is so much more productive than judging them by some rigid standards and casting them aside. An act of kindness costs us nothing. There is no right or wrong when it comes to benevolence and understanding.

"Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty." - Mother Teresa

Life is very short and fleeting, so while we are here isn't it to our benefit to engage in God's love and compassion for our fellow man? We have an abundance of hate and horrendous atrocities occurring in this world and not nearly enough respect for humankind. If there are those who feel they have been saved and redeemed by God's good grace, is it not their duty to pay this forward, not by taking up the mantle of harsh and narrow minded judgment upon others, but with the same kindness and forgiveness that was bestowed upon them?

Human beings, if left to their plebian thoughts and matters of the flesh are truly monuments to darkness and wretchedness. Our one redeeming quality is our inner spirit, which gives us the ability to transcend our limited physical state and to be the compassionate beings we were meant to be. There is worth in all human life and it is up to us to find that worth and honor it, in ourselves and in others.

One never knows when the smallest act of kindness will change a life.

"Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. "
Leo Buscaglia