First and foremost, I know deep in my heart that I am about
to piss off a lot of devoutly religious people with this post. I understand that up front.
I’d apologize but, well, that’s just not how
I do things.
I have a simple and honest question that I wish someone
could answer for me without
simultaneously calling me an unbeliever, heathen,
or suddenly feeling the need to baptize me or pray for my immortal soul. Why is it that a segment of our population
seems so hell bent on mixing God up with their money?
As many of you know, I work in the rent-to-own industry and
have for a decade now. It never ceases
to amaze me how many of our customers seek to solve their financial problems
through “the power of prayer” instead of actually doing something about their
situation. Not a week goes by that I
don’t have at least five discussions with customers where the answer to their
financial situation is that they will have to pray about it and see what God
will provide.
Now, don’t misunderstand me.
If your faith is such that you take your problems to the Almighty in
prayer than I admire your dedication.
What I have a problem with is that so many people seem to think that
simply praying over the problem will solve it.
I can’t tell you the number of times that I’ve had to repossess
merchandise from a customer who couldn’t pay their bill because the “divine
handout” didn’t get there in time.
I’ve been in desperate financial straits many times in my
life and yes, some have resulted in prayers for guidance but I can’t for the
life of me understand why someone would pray for the holy money truck to dump
on their front lawn! My faith has always
landed more to the “God helps those who help themselves” line of thinking I
guess.
Where I fail to reach any form of understanding is when an
adult who lives in the real world (sorry to burst any Matrix bubbles that may
be hanging around but Neo was actually fiction) feels that prayer will
magically solve the problem. Where I get
frustrated is when the solution to the problem is in fact as simple as a phone
call to explain a period of hardship and make some arrangements to handle the
problem. Where I get enraged is when
someone tells me they’re going to sick God on me and pray for my ruination
because their decisions led to a negative outcome for them. I hate to tell some people but if I show up
on your front door to repossess your television, it’s probably not because God
didn’t send mana from heaven to cover your bills. It’s most likely because you decided to spend
your bill money on weed and beer last weekend and want to use your
break-glass-in-case-of-uhoh faith as an excuse or worse a shield to gloss over
your failings.
Look I’ve made some seriously
bad mistakes in my life when it comes to the almighty dollar but I can promise
you right fucking now that God, Jesus, Buddha, Allah, Jevohah, Yaweh, Odin,
Thor, Loki, The World Turtle, nor good ol’ L.Ron had a damn thing to do with
them. They were my mistakes and I had to
solve them on my own.
It seems that I have the same conversation year after year
in my line of work. I can never quite
get over the lack of responsibility for personal actions that seems to permeate
so much of our society now. Granted I
see a lot more of the 40 year old adolescent mentality given what I do for a
living but still, at some point someone has to say there is a line here
folks!
Does God belong in a family’s finances? Hey that’s totally
your call and up to your beliefs. The
only problem I have is when your beliefs, as with so many other things, get in
the way of common sense and you stop acting in your own best interest and start
relying on a religious crutch instead of just simply doing something to solve
your own problems yourself.
See you next time kiddies!
