Forgive me Heavenly Father for I have sinned. I am unable to recall my last confession, though we both know it has been quite some time since we've spoken. I still go to church and read the Bible, but my personal crisis of faith has hampered my yearning to call upon You within the confines of prayer.
It's not that I no longer believe in Your presence or in the authority of the Holy See, after all I am both a committed theist and a practising Catholic, but I am unsure if Your benevolent hand guides our affairs anymore. Is it because we, Your greatest creation, also turned out to be Your greatest disappointment?
The acts of terror that transpired across the globe last week have sickened me; how men who kill in Your name think those acts will earn them favour and an afterlife in paradise.
I know this is not what You intended in the grand design of Man, drawing from the very essence of the universe to imbue us all with the divine spark of life. In Your genius and grace You gave us free will, but alas there are those amongst us who have corrupted that gift, and instead of working towards a common good have sought only the ruin and desolation of mankind.
I can't help but feel anger towards them. Every day I have to remind myself that there is good in the world. But such optimism seems pointless when faced with an onslaught of pain and suffering. How are we to resist the desire to seek vengeance? To answer this Jihad with a Crusade, just as Christendom had done during the 11th century, this time wielding shot and shell in place of sword and spear, to punish the evil-doers. Of course, my better sense tells me that violence cannot be answered with violence, and that no one can claim the moral high ground when we are all standing in blood.
As one of the three Abrahamic traditions, Christianity stands as the middle child between our elder and younger siblings, Judaism and Islam. We too have had our share of fanatics throughout our 2000-year history. Just this past November 5 was England's celebration of Guy Fawkes Night, the annual commemoration of the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605, a plan instigated by Catholic radicals to assassinate the Protestant King James I.
And lest we forget the atrocities committed by the European armies when they descended on Jerusalem in 1099. After heeding the call to "take up the Cross," believing that You "willed it," didn't they slaughter men, women, and children, making no distinction between Muslim, Jew or Christian.
Men have proven themselves quite adept at the craft of war, and we are willing to wage it in Your name as we are for the sake of avarice. Even now in Israel, the land You promised to the Jews, some of Your "Chosen People" have taken it upon themselves to cleanse that very land of Arab interlopers.
The truth is evident that such madmen are everywhere and are confined to no single religion. Since all were written by man's hand their teachings can be interpreted to sway some us to do unspeakable things to each other. But at the same time we can't blame all for the actions of a few. Just as not every German was a Nazi, so too not every Muslim is a terrorist.
The irony is that all religions, regardless of their origins and the language with which they speak Your name, essentially espouse the same message: To love one another as You have loved us, and to do more for others than we do for ourselves. It's not enough to say the words, we must practice what we preach. It is the responsibility of each and every one of us to do our best to leave this world a better place than which we entered it. So I beseech thee–forgive us Heavenly Father, for we have all sinned. Amen.