Breaking: Katrina not act of God

NarcoNews is on the theological beat, discovers God did not create Katrina to punish sinners, or at least not what American religious leaders have called sinners given their direct line to God. And it's also not Bush's God. You know, the one who helps him make par on the golf course.

Katrina has come and gone and left havoc in her wake. President Bush and his team of Homeland Security bungle their way along as people suffer and die. And somewhere, someone is going to excuse them of their responsibility in all this and try to change the focus and talk about an "act of God." I don't believe it was. I believe in a God that said many times the past week, "Oh shit," and cried. I have no idea what President Bush said or will say, or if he is able to cry. I do feel sorry for the man who won't acknowledge mistakes and seems to think he is God.

For eight years I lived in a cardboard and tin shack in Nueva Tacagua [outside Caracas]. Day after day I saw my neighbors walk out of their homes with a newspaper in their hands. It was not the daily newspaper. It was an old newspaper with their morning dump inside. We didn't speak to each other on such occasions. We didn't even look at each other. We just walked out, threw our packet up or down the mountainside and returned to our shacks. It was not only a matter of physical relief; it was also a psychological elimination of frustration as we threw the parcel as far away as we could and tried to dream of a new day....

I have come to believe in a mighty, mighty God. I no longer believe in an ALL-mighty one.

There is so much that is good and beautiful in the world. I like the idea that it is God's handiwork. It makes me feel good and gives me hope.

But then shit happens. My stomach aches. Water pours out of my eyes. My heart weighs a ton. I look at this God in whom I believe and I ask why. The only answer that I get is, "I didn't want it to be that way. I tried my best to make it all perfect and am still trying, but I goofed and I am sorry." And then we cry together and go back to work, trying to correct the situation.

In my way of thinking, God didn't want what human beings have dubbed as "acts of God." They are not acts of some devil either. They are simply the results of mistakes God made in creating - big and bad mistakes of a mighty, mighty power.

I write this on a computer and I realize that at any moment the screen may go blank and I might lose everything that I have written. It is a great machine. It isn't perfect. Neither is my God and yet I am at peace and in love with my God.

In Nueva Tacagua I saw people who were acting as though they were insane. They were. They were also hungry and when they had food, they were no longer crazy. You may think I am nuts, too, and need something to nourish my brain at this moment, but (as an example of my way of belief) I think President Bush lacks some books in his library. If he had them all, he wouldn't be acting as he is and as he has. God flubbed with George W. And the world is suffering because of the mistake....

I wish my God were perfect and all-powerful. He/she/it is not. I am not either. So, together, we go on making mistakes, asking for forgiveness and crying each time we have to say, "Oh shit."

We will also go on trying to change that reality.