days, all in the name of God.
If He was anything like His followers, it wouldn't be murder. It would be pesticide. As far as I was concerned, this contract terminated with God.
Or me.
I withdrew what revalued money I had out of my various bank accounts and relocated to an office in the old Union Bank Building. It stood northwest of Arco Tower and had been protected from the bomb blast in South Tower by the bulk of North Tower's mass. I snuck back into my old office at night to remove everything I needed.
The next couple of days were spent in the new office overlooking the decaying ruin of Old Downtown. I sat by the window, thinking.
There had to be a way to kill God even if there was no
before or after the act. If God didn't exist in some real, tangible way, then what was I up against? An idea, as Golding and Corbin both implied? Could an idea be so powerful as to rule the minds of men for a hundred centuries?
I shrugged. If people can believe in 'just wars' and 'honest politicians,' they can believe in an all-powerful, all- seeing, totally benevolent God who permits suffering and evil to exist. When you begin with false premises, you can get any conclusion you want. True or false.
If God did exist, regardless of how He was perceived, perhaps He could be flushed out into the open by the same sort of tactics I'd use if He were only an idea. Maybe God isn't dead-but He's not at all well. How powerful is a God who-in spite of Biblical warnings-is mocked, and mocked repeatedly with every disaster that's labeled an Act of God, our supposed protector?
How alive is a God that everyone laughs at? Or ignores? Or forgets?
This was giving me a headache. I switched on the TV plaque and flipped through the channels with the remote.
Channel 3 was running the fourteenth chapter of
I'd seen it. Channel 4 had a commercial for a licorice-flavored cereal called Krunchy Molas. Kids stuck black- stained tongues at the screen while a chorus sang the jingle.
I switched before I lost
breakfast cereal.
I flipped right past a rerun episode of
without stopping. Channel 7 was screening a double feature in its Appropriate Billing series. They were running this duo under their combined titles:
That was better than last week's coupling:
I flipped to UHF. On Channel 23, piped in from Disney County, was one of the most odious talk shows on the air. It was also one of the most popular.
'Ladies and gentlemen,' snarled a vicious announcer, 'and all you welfare bums and draft-dodging slimeballs-it's time for'-a drum rolled, a flank of bugles sounded-'the most moral show on television,
With your host-a paragon of virtue who never lets a guest escape unscathed-`Beaver' Lenny!'
The audience cheered as if it were Superbowl Sunday. 'Beaver' Lenny strode onscreen like a president on inauguration day. The camera angle was such that he looked taller than any mortal. He had silver hair, even though he was only thirty-five. The suit he wore was Wall Street Traditional. He smiled like a college kid and spoke with as much animated enthusiasm.
'All right!' he shouted, his dark eyes glaring at the camera with feral glee. 'How do you feel tonight?'
'Morally outraged!' the studio audience cheered.
I was ready to find another station when he yelled back at them.
