Okay. Maybe I don’t put up as many posts as I should. Maybe I’ve been busy. Maybe sick. Maybe tired. Maybe I’ll just start every sentence with ” maybe.” Maybe I don’t really know where this stuff ever comes from, so I can’t very well keep to a schedule. Maybe when it does show up, I just have to go with it. Maybe you didn’t think of that. Maybe I’m done with ” maybe.”

I have apparently summoned the assistance this evening of one J. Swaggart, a TV evangelist that I don’t personally buy for one split second. Talk about a Roger with Issues. He’s the whole package. Good at it, though, if you like that sort of thing. Charles Stanley is my guy, a Clark in Clark’s clothing, and rides through all that and does his job anyway. A bit to the right, as you might expect; apparently, the R. Williams- penned ” separation of church and state” has not yet made it beyond the Rhode Island border. Maybe in another four hundred years or so. Maybe I digress, and maybe I will now swing around and address the point of this epistle. You’ll appreciate this. Rogers are nothing if not brave, courageous and bold. So with no further ado…

I hope to prove ( or at least illustrate) the existence of God.

This got started from the comment that I put up a short while ago, and actually should be seen as just an extension of that. If I do this right, you’ll see the tie-in. If I drop the ball….well, you have a try and see how far you get. Okay, then. Here we go.

When people try to conceive of God, their thoughts generally run towards the macro; everything quickly moves to the grandest and largest scale that we can imagine. Huge old guys with beards…majestic mountains, the wonders of nature, the vastness of the universe… then we grow tired from the strain and have to give up the chase. It’s all just too much to try to consider at once. And, it doesn’t actually work. Because things aren’t necessarily divine- inspired just because they’re big. ( Did you know that one light-year equals 5.9 trillion miles ?) So if you try to prove God by going big, your models just endlessly increase in scale, every aspect increases dramatically in complexity, and you’ve got nothing to show for it. So, in spite of his best efforts, J. Swaggart ends up with a fleet of  Cadillacs, lots of  ” girlfriends” , thinks he’s talking to the old guy with the beard, and only so-so ratings at best. And he is no closer to an answer than anybody else has ever been.

Sorry to pull the rug on you there, Jim. Nothing personal. Just needed to cite an example. But thanks for coming by.

All right, then. My approach is to address the issue by going in the other direction. Go small. Because, in this universe, things tend to get simpler as you get smaller. So I’m going to take this where you probably expect it to go right about now. And then… I’ll ask you a question. And if you can honestly answer that question, then you will know for yourself whether God exists or not. ” Sound Good?” ( spoken as Brad Pitt in ” Inglorious  Basterds”) Okay, then. Let’s go.

First, we need a graphic physical example; so I’ll ask each of you to consider your own  thumbnail. It’s a perfectly good example, and it’s conveniently located, right there on the end of your arm.

Now it gets a little trickier… stay with me on this. Watch this carefully, and hold the train of logic through to the end. It’ s awfully hard to do; because it is so astoundingly simple that you will miss it at first. It is so astoundingly simple that everyone has missed this, all along. It is truly difficult to focus your mind on something that fundamentally isn’t there, like quasars. You can prove them mathematically, but you’ll never be able to see them. You can only infer that they’re there. So then, are they literally popping in and out of existence as we know it? Makes my stomach hurt. Anyway, off that, that’s digressing again. Back to our thumbs.

Okay… your thumb is made up of cells. Hundreds of thousands of cells.

Those cells are made up of molecules.

The molecules are comprised of atoms. Hundreds of millions.

The atoms are comprised of trillions of sub-atomic particles. ( Nucleus, protons, electrons, neutrons).

At this point, were I you, I’d expect something along these lines..”there is such beauty and structure in the sub-atomic model that it absolutely proves that God exists,” etc, etc, blah blah….

No. That is not where I’m going. This has nothing whatever to do with romantic platitudes on any scale, big or small. Platitudes make us feel all warm and fuzzy, but don’t prove a damned thing. Don’t go there. Stay with me on this.

We are down to the sub-atomic model. The particles are whirring maniacally around the nucleus, and if we reverse the direction of the logic, then sub-atomic becomes atom, in turn becomes molecule, then cell, then ultimately…your damned thumb. And a scientist would use each step of that chain  as concrete physical observable proof of the next. And your thumb goes to  your arm, to humans in general, to the whole planet’s physical characteristics, and before you know it, you’re across the universe with that runaway logic that can’t do anything else but keep expanding. And, you missed it. We have to go back, all the way to the sub-atomic model, and stay there until we see it. I don’t think we’re even designed to see it.

Okay. Sub-atomic. Particles revolving around nucleus, absolutely doing one thing to all exclusion; being an atom. The smallest structure that we are aware of. And yet the atom itself can be broken into parts that don’t really even exist at all without each other’s total involvement and co-operation.

Okay…so now, just hold that image in your mind. Sub-atomic particles fervently working together to be an atom. And please resist the urge to draw platitudes…yes, it’s amazing, beautiful, mysterious….just don’t focus on that. Just hold the image, and let me ask you this…

Why?

Why do they do it? Why do those particles insist on working so hard to be an atom?

Why don’t they just…stop? They could simply dissipate…and the universe would cease to exist. Their determinism is the only reason that anything exists, on any scale, anywhere in the entire unfathomably large universe. It doesn’t really have to do with life as we know it, because very little matter actually supports life. Most atoms by far are busy being inanimate objects or substances. So after tossing out all the platitudes that you can possibly conceive of, I’ll ask you again…why do they insist on existing when there is no particularly compelling reason for them to go to the trouble?

Here’s my take on it. I hold that there is a binding, absolutely unexplainable force that keeps the sub-atomic structure intact, and allows us to continue to exist. That force accounts for everything that we can possibly conceive of, and does not require our understanding of it to continue to work. We are actually just a small component of the grand scheme of things, and when we insist on trying to understand this stuff, then human cultures tend to create the persona of God. It gives our very limited conception something to work with. It’s as close as we can get without going totally insane, and if we can just manage not to kill each other off over fighting about God, then we’ve really accomplished something.  And if all that is just my own little personal platitude, then I’ll ask you again. Why do sub-atomic particles insist on being atoms? The answer is right there…on your thumbnail.

And as for life…we might be the only little speck of mud in the universe that has the proper balance of factors to actually support life …just us, out of hundreds of millions of other specks of mud…yeah, that’s random. That had to be an accident. Are you serious? Do the math. We haven’t any right to be here…it’s a freaking miracle that we’re here at all. Hey…wait…where have I heard that before?