CHAPTER 121 aMy mother used to make us kids go to church,
2 And it seemed to me that even God was getting better all the time,
3 Just like the world,
4 bBecause the Old God got so mad about the apple,
5 cAnd killed everybody but Noah in the flood,
6 dAnd wanted Abraham to kill his son Isaac,
7 Which scared me a lot at the time,
8 Until I asked my father about it,
9 And he said that God wasn't like that anymore,
10 eBecause he had a son of his own now,
11 And knew better,
12 Which made me feel better,
13 And I thanked Jesus for having been born,
14 And I just never connected Him with all the trouble the Catholics got into with the fInquisition,
15 Because that was back in the Middle Ages,
16 Before there was an America,
17 gWhere it was okay to have differences of opinion,
18 Without burning each other to death.
CHAPTER 131 Maybe that's why I never understood it when my sons kind of blamed me and my generation for the hKlan,
2 And all the racism and so forth,
3 Because I never once burned a cross,
|
|
4 And was always very respectful to it instead,
5 Since it was in church,
6 And you had to be respectful in church,
7 Because Mrs. Anthrax would rap your knuckles in Sunday school if you weren't,
8 Which hurt a lot,
9 So you learned to behave whether you wanted to or not,
10 And besides, church was God's house,
11 iJust like America was His country,
12 Where all of us thought we were getting better at getting it right,
13 The way He wanted it,
14 jBecause nobody else had Abraham Lincoln,
15 Who was kind of God's nephew the way I thought of it,
16 Which was all wrong, of course,
17 But it made me think sometimes when I was doing wrong, what would Abraham Lincoln say if he could see me now,
18 Which was easier than thinking about Jesus,
19 Because Jesus was on the cross,
20 And Lincoln was on the penny,
21 And closer somehow.
CHAPTER 141 And it's a funny thing, but I didn't think about Lincoln for years,
2 Maybe because it's harder to think about great men as you get older,
3 Since life teaches you that it isn't easy to be great,
4 And you're probably not going to make it,
|