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Written on a banknote. Which has always made me chuckle. Money makes the world go round and apparently the heavenly kingdom too. Which either means God is everywhere in everything – or we prefer to put God to work for our own ends – or probably both. Not convinced God minds as much as I do.

And then this morning the same phrase, this time on a “Stop The Steal” Facebook Group banner.  Stop the Steal 2020 – in God we trust.

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I have watched this election through the lens of our BBC news network. Not through Facebook. If the news media is biased, then (let’s put God to work again) God help us when it comes to the fiction and fantasy spread via Facebook. As for Twitter and the twits who launch bile in bytes, or Insta with a pretty picture and a perfectly made-up narrative … never got into those narcissistic temples of self-belief.

I have watched a first world country, allegedly, model itself on a denigrated and dismissed third world “democracy”. Stop the Steal (in God we trust) is great alliteration. Same as Make America Great and Make America Great Again (in God we trust for both versions). Both trip off the tongue and fit perfectly onto silly red hats. Same as our UK government’s Corona Virus alliteration – which is always a three-part-alliteration – always intended to move my behaviour and belief to that the government wishes me to follow – a whole intellectual and academic, scientific and humanitarian debate distilled into three word/parts of alliteration. Thank God we are endowed with such brilliance!

In God We Trust.

Is the same distillation – just been around for a lot longer than Stop the Steal. Just like that other one … “In Jesus’ name we ask” (make sure I add an apostrophe in the right place). Always latched on to the end of a prayer list.  Always biblically correct.  Because God cannot do anything but deliver the prayer list if we ask in Jesus’ name (the bible itself says so).  Another whole intellectual and academic, scientific and humanitarian debate distilled into a neat trip off the tongue phrase.  Once again I am not so sure God objects as I object.

I am reminded again how all sides pray to God for polar opposite prayer lists.  How all sides created a particular God that suits the religion and faith they weave and wove  around reach particular God.  Whole global faiths – each with their own sacred texts – their own religions and belief – each trying to convince everyone else theirs is the one true God – each trashing everyone else’s God (or at best accommodating it as an asset to be used to promote their proper true God’s place in this world).

Stop the Steal.  I won you know.

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I actually don’t care anymore.  I don’t care which faith is the one true God faith.  I don’t care if Trump stays in the White House (or a golf course).  I look at Biden and see another rich moneyed OAP seeking (with every billion he can raise) the same position of power – chasing his own 4 (or 8) years minutes of fame.

Not much will change.  Half the population will be forgotten.  Half the globe will be a resource producing opportunity.  Twitter will still twit.  Insta will still preen or prickle.  Facebook will still Trust in God as it demonises those who also Trust in the same and different God(s).  Money will still make the world go around. Stop the Steal will become another neat piece of alliteration we can all take to the streets over.  A vaccine will mean we can all do that without masks AND be okay to not have to fight the “mask wars”.  Vaccine wars will begin as the conspiracy ballistics ignite over that “debate” (with its own brilliant alliteration).

We will still trust in god.  We will still put god to work to champion our current chosen alliteration handle.  And I still think God doesn’t object to this madhouse as much as I do.

In Jesus’ name began in a madhouse just as this one.  A madhouse that did just as well in a pre-digital age.  That was just as weird.  That Trusted in God(s) just as we “trust” now.   Where money made the world go around just as now.  Where half the globe was a resource producing opportunity for the other.  Where mis-truths and spin were just part of daily life as much as now.

If God chose that time and place to do the Jesus Story then … in God I really do trust!

A God who says Love is it, always and forever in all ages and times, in all places and with all people.  I know where I am with a God of Love – and I think God does as well.  But people, power and politics?

Seems they prefer to trust in God and not in Love.   And that’s why I think God objects to all of this less than I object.  God is Love (I believe) and all the other “God Stuff” juts a heap of noise, just as all the “In God we Trust” labels (and neat alliteration) is just us “trusting” in god as we choose..

I believe.

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