Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 (Tek) 9/26/83; site azure.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!harpo!ihnp4!houxm!hogpc!houti!ariel!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!azure!jonw
From: jonw@azure.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion,net.singles
Subject: Re: Re: Weird and wonderful idea
Message-ID: <2538@azure.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 16-Feb-84 14:04:41 EST
Article-I.D.: azure.2538
Posted: Thu Feb 16 14:04:41 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 19-Feb-84 02:44:23 EST
Organization: Tektronix, Beaverton OR
Lines: 35

Open letter to Jeff Sargent:

Your submission has got to be one of the most plaintive and heartfelt items 
that I have read on the net.  The only thing that I can do to help (and I
realize that you are not likely to view this as "help") is to tell you what I
think part of your problem is.  

Everyone, at one time or another, has experienced the type of loneliness that 
you have described, but you have compounded your misery by believing that a 
personal god is controlling events in your life.  What is He trying to tell 
you?  What plans does He have for you?  What does all of this mean?  The 
obvious answer to these questions is NOTHING.  You are futilely ascribing  an
importance to events that just isn't there.

If you choose to live your life in a superstitious fashion, believing that some
deity is constantly rewarding/punishing you and everyone else, then I guarantee
that you will never be able to view the world through anything other than the
foggiest of glasses.

So, my advice to you is stop trying to carry all that superstitious baggage
and start seeing life for what it really is:  a mixture of joy and pain that 
is somewhat in your power to control, but often seems subject to events beyond 
your control.  There comes a time for all of us to cast aside belief in Santa 
Claus and the Tooth Fairy, and likewise comes a time when any thinking 
individual must decide whether the whole concept of a personal god is realistic
or just someone else's wishful thinking.  I realize that there are a lot of
folks out there who are desperately clinging on to a belief in supernatural
religion because they fear that life would be meaningless without it, and to
them I can say only their life must be truly meaningless if they must use a 
fairy tale to justify their existence.		

Send flames to net.religion or via mail -- I don't read net.singles.

			Jon White
			[decvax|ucbvax]!tektronix!tekmdp!azure!jonw