Achievement Unlocked

I have a pet peeve. It's a petty peeve, but a peeve nonetheless. Let's say you're very ill and decide to go to the doctor. The doctor runs some tests and determines it's serious. Oh no, doomed, etcetera. Let's then say the doctor treats you using medicines and knowledge gained from science. Great, you're now healthy again! However, you don't hear "Wow, thank goodness for doctors and science." You instead hear "Thank God, He has blessed you with health!"

No, no, no. That is what I find so frustrating. I've been told we are "blessed" to have this "miracle" and so on. I've even been told that the birth of this child will be a conversion experience for me and I will finally see what this god guy is all about. I'm sorry, but that couldn't be further from the truth. As exciting and cool as having a baby is, it is by no means some miracle, full of sacred secrets and magic. It's cells replicating, a body forming, all the things that make us who we are copying and making another one of us. It's been going on for millions of years, all the way back to the original sludge.

Of course, if you're religious and you're reading that, chances are you don't agree at all with my statement and feel that I just haven't had the right experience to properly justify the god you believe to be true. But again, that is wrong. I'm not a secret Christian underneath my skin and bones. There is no underlying wish for any of it to be true. So when you tell me that I am "blessed" with a "miracle," I can't help but laugh out loud. What I believe to be true is far more fascinating then a lonely deity forming people from dust and playing with them until he decides he wants to have a little more fun and turn things into a meticulous fairy tale of war, struggle, and defeat of evil.

I think I've gone a little far off the topic I had intended. See, along with people saying a child is a blessing, yada yada yada, there are people saying that god blessed them with this or that. God blessed you with your job? So you had nothing to do with that? You didn't present yourself professionally, go to school, have the right attitude? You didn't make an effort to make yourself appear like a good potential employee? If you did none of those things and still managed to get work, chances are you know somebody. If that too is false, then you are either very lucky or there is a god who loves to bestow petty blessings on random people.

I understand that for someone believing in god, especially the god of Christianity, giving thanks to that god is part of the process. Giving thanks is mentioned in the Bible and humility, all that good jazz that's good when used properly. What is wrong with a sense of achievement though? The idea that you got your blessing because you worked for it, you made it happen. There should be nothing wrong with congratulating yourself on a job well done. Instead of giving credit to a deity who can't even make himself present enough for fear of providing proof of his existence, thus ruining his epic tale of salvation.

In short, I want our kid to have a sense of obligation towards his/her future, actions, accomplishments. Don't wait for a blessing or work less because you believe that you will be blessed. When you nail that job interview and get that awesome job, you did that because you worked for it. There was no light from heaven gleaming in the eyes of the person interviewing you making you look employable. Be proud of your achievements in life, they didn't happen by chance.

And for goodness sake, if you find $50 on the ground, don't claim that god blessed you with it because you tithed. Somebody is $50 short and certainly isn't thanking god for blessing them with more wallet space.