StarCat/CatStar

WAR IS GOD (polemic)
By Virs Rana
God is defined as the Supreme Being, or, god, a supreme being, who is
worshipped. Worship is showing reverential admiration, respect, and
faith, usually toward some deity. A deity is someone who is more powerful
than humans.
Since most of us do not witness the power of God, or some god, on a
regular basis, we often feel helpless to accommodate our basic needs and
wants. Though many attend a church, a temple, or a mosque, for, at least
one day of the week, this hardly seems enough to maintain against the
trials and tribulations of our daily sowing. And since most of us are not
educated about who, and what we are, we long to see, in some way, the
manifestation of something greater than ourselves. And what is it that
happens every day, to which we are all witness that appears more
powerful than we are? Death,of course.
And as we are duly informed, most deities from ancient times to the
present sustain because they have conquered death, as we hear and read.
So how do we, mere mortals, participate in this power and glory? Well, we
presume to do as much as we can. And what we can do very well is kill,
because death, ours and others, becomes our affirmation of God, and our
unique association with him/her/it. Reference various scriptures from
major religions where God invokes His believers to protect His name, His
people, and His law. But who gets to decide when a transgression against
these invocations occurs? And what is the appropriate response? These
are questions lost to the ubiquitous claim that our/my action against the
other is purely a defensive action, and, therefore, justified. Thus, curiously,
no one truly offends. And still there is war. Perhaps it’s time to point our
fingers at ourselves.
So whether some god inhabits your family, gang, tribe, nation, religion,
philosophy, science, or what we call the universe, matters not, for we have
erred on the side of entropic power: We are here. We are us. You are there.
You are them. We give cause for us more than for them. We mourn for us
more than for them.
The fact that we choose to participate in only half the equation is
considered irrelevant. For the acquired security and proof of 'might is
right' is our god-given mandate to affect death, stand beside it, not be
touched by it, except for any wounds and scars that remain as a tribute to
our survival through it all, and if we die, become martyrs to the cause.
Those who would bristle at the above proposition need look no further
than our history books, which do not record times of peace, but of war.
From the Homeric Wars, to the latest war, and just about any other word
you choose to precede or follow ‘war’, Pyrrhic, Punic, Crusaders, Hundred
Years, Thirty Years, Seven Weeks, Six Day, Napoleonic, American