YOU DON'T HAVE TO GO TO CHURCH TO GO TO HEAVEN 6.8.08 This past week I was kicked out of the Christian hardcore band I was in. This shouldn’t really come as a surprise, because I’m not actually Christian. Truth be told, I haven’t considered myself a Christian since 8th grade, which as of today was over 15 years ago. I think I’d be more okay if I had been told that I wasn’t a good enough musician, which I could understand more readily. I’m not a true musician and usually just get by with some intellect, experimentation, and repetitiveness. But to be kicked out after being with the band through its initial period, writing some songs and playing some great shows, then essentially breaking up when one member went on tour with a national band, then just after the national band breaks up and we regroup to try to kick-start things again and I get booted out. The band may not even make it too much further because of other obstacles, so it’s definitely a curious development. Am I upset that I was kicked out? I wouldn’t consider myself upset, but I certainly don’t agree with the ‘reason’ for kicking me out, which was essentially because of my ‘un-Christian-like’ behavior of…moving in with my girlfriend… First of all, that begs the question that if I had responded that I would not actually move in with my girlfriend, would I have been allowed to remain in the band? I didn’t bother asking, but I somehow doubt it. The rest of the rationale used was that the band didn’t want to be misrepresented to those they were playing to and what their music stood for. That makes perfect sense to me except for the fact that I was allowed in the band to begin with. Maybe some of the guys had their misgivings back then and just didn’t speak up, and maybe they felt going forward they wanted to correct that. That makes me wonder about acceptance of other beliefs, which I thought was a great point on playing with these guys initially. I thought they accepted me despite being a lowly non-Christian, which obviously isn’t the case anymore. The only question that brings to mind is wondering whether or not Jesus would let me play in his band – and you know what, I think he would. It just feels like a bit of a letdown. Or maybe I expected too much. When I hit upon religious questions these days, I always refer back to Piers Anthony’s Incarnations of Immortality series. One of the main topics included in this series is that the various Incarnations notice that a lot of the so-called ‘sins’ seem fairly outdated. I won’t get into any examples, but suffice it to say that some things considered sinful in the year ‘0’ of our Lord Jesus Christ are a bit less taboo some 20 centuries later and might be due for an update. And I’d say I agree with that. I also know I’m not perfect, but in a joking conversation with some friends was essentially told that they could get away with certain things simply because they believed in Jesus, while I can’t (at least not when dealing with Christians). Maybe that example isn’t too close to reality for most devout Christians, but I’ve often thought of that potential cop-out whereby a person could commit murder and be forgiven in the Lord’s eyes simply because they believe and are sorry about it. The Boondock Saints was a superb movie, but to suggest people should be able to do that in real life is another story altogether. I also play softball in a church league. The going joke there is, “You don’t have to go to church to go to Heaven, but you have to go to church to play softball.” This season the agreement is that I have to go to church three times during the season. I don’t mind it much, I have a lot of friends that go to that church and it’s good for fellowship and hanging out. In the end, I don’t think it’s that big of a deal. It’s another example that not only can you not paint everyone with the same broad stroke, but that people and their thoughts/opinions change even when nothing else does. This article was written by angelduzt. Send thoughts and comments to duzt@lifeduzt.net.