I always wondered when someone would synthesize God, crypto, and decentralization Into one beautifully written post, and here we are. If this doesn't vie for post of the week, then something's wrong. It also touches on the sharp edges of so many subjects, that it's triggered the bees to swarm around in my own head. But religion and politics, two things I usually avoid talking about here (but not on Twitter!) and dammit if they aren't tied together here with a very uncomfortable bow indeed.

So let's tackle one of them. That old boogeyman called religion.

I grew up in a very "religious" family, while also being born with a very logical mind. Always wanted to know why things were the way they were. Instead of a rich dad and a poor dad, I had a rich grandmother and a poor grandmother. The rich one grew up in Texas and married a man who ended up running several churches and businesses (it became hard to tell the difference between the two) she was an avid social climber who bragged about how much money they had. The poor one grew up in South Carolina, worked with her hands and did right by everyone. Guess which one I loved the most?

Peeking behind the curtain and seeing my rich grandfather (or Oz as I should call him) at work, was a thing to behold. In public, they were the picture of perfection at the dinner table however, their true haughty disdain for working people were on full display. I saw the rot up close. The tricks used to get poor people to donate more money, the collection plate passed around a second or even a third time, with angry denunciations from grandpop the pastor for the poor not giving enough. Not that he needed it mind you, he didn't, but he wanted it and boy he got it.

The pastor sleeping with the church secretary, prolific spending, churches resembling businesses "didn't Jesus kick the money changers out of the Temple for a reason? Something about not turning the house of God into a place of commerce?" I wondered. I've seen it all, with the tip of the spear being when they laughed at the dinner table about a guy who'd committed suicide at the local park. Seeing so much of that caused me to leave that church but not to discard my beliefs.

So I get it, I really do.

But then there's that whole "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" thing.

If you're an agnostic, from someone like me with a questioning mind searching for answers, I can understand that, but atheism seems far too restrictive for such an expansive mindset. Someone once asked me to prove God exists, I said "you're walking around on it." the planets, the stars all of it supposedly cast from absolutely nothing in a glorious Big Bang. Makes perfect sense to me that somebody had to make something from nothing. But to each his own. Since this "comment" is becoming the length of a post, I'd better wrap up.

Think of it this way. If God is Satoshi Nakamoto, the The Word is his cryptocurrency with each believer being a decentralized node in the network mining more "crypto" to be spread around the world.

I don't try to change anyone's mind. You're wise enough to make your own decisions. There's tons of information out there for inquisitive people willing to do the digging. For those of you whose minds are still open and would like to know more about Genesis, I highly recommend this book if you'd like to read a deep dive on some things The Bible mentions, that they won't cover in church. Warning: It's a wild ride and a long deeply-researched book. If your mind is already closed, skip it. But if like me, you believe in the free-flow of information and always wonder "why" about so many things in the Bible GET THIS BOOK.