I hope when the New Atheism ceases to be the coolest religious trend, it gets replaced by New Polytheism. I hope it’s a DIY sort of religion, where we all get to make our own new Gods. I hope folks come up with clever names.

A friend of mine recently said that religion resonates in the same part of us that poetry does- a non-literal part, an imaginative part, a creative narrative part. I think my friend is a genius on this matter, and it’s led me to think about the creativity of religion, which so often gets wrung out with the attempts to prove it.

I pretty much cannot wait until we move to the next religious fad, and I pray to God (who I think more or less gets what I am saying here, and doesn’t hold it against me) that it’s polytheism. Aren’t we due, really, for some household gods? And honestly- I have to admit, it’s a cognitive stretch for me to contemplate that the same God who has his eye on the sparrow and counts all the feathers on it’s head is also the same God who is busy creating universes whole cloth, and also is the same God I mutter an urgent “Holy crap, please let me defeat physical reality by catching my bus on time even though I just woke up and the bus will be at the bus stop in eleven minutes, please please please!” plea to on the unfortunately not rare enough occasions that I sleep in. Not to mention that it would be pretty awesome, really, for the big three religions if, instead of fighting over the attributes of God (which *must* really annoy God!) we could all be released to just actually draft different versions of Gods.

Some Gods I’d like to initiate:

The God of the things my cat sees when she is staring out the window at nothing at all, but very intently.

The God of almost always missing that last step, but still not falling on your face.

The God of forgiveness for uncomfortable conversations on the elevator.

The God who watches over long ago boyfriends so you can stop obsessing over them.

The God who got you through 8th grade, somehow.

The God of finding your tax returns at the last minute.

The God of finding beautiful, soul connecting random passages when looking over strangers shoulders at the books they are reading on the bus.

Etc.

Frankly, I’d like to see a world where instead of killing each other over A God (and/or his non-existence), we could all instead engage in a Marketplace of Gods, where we get to barter and engage in all sorts of religious intercourse and bidding and etc over our various incarnations of diety.

It just seems, potentially, endlessly more fun.

Advertisement