Going to a Catholic school gave me the opportunity to read the Bible. It wasn’t that we ever had to read it in school; there were just a lot of them lying around and it gave you something to read during history class. I also kept one in my bathroom for a while. You’d be surprised how much reading you can get done by just leaving the material in the bathroom.After spending some quality time with the good book, I realized there were a lot of things in it that I had a hard time understanding. For example, Leviticus 18:22: “No man is to have sexual relations with another man; God hates that.” I had to read it twice. I found it hard enough to believe that an omniscient god would really be concerned about homosexuality, but he actually hates it. As it turned out just a few chapters later in Leviticus 20:13, the punishment for sexual relations with another man was death. I guess he really does hate it.But I had heard that Jesus was a pretty hip cat, and in “Jesus Christ Superstar” he seemed like a real “with-it” kind of guy. So I skipped to the New Testament; the stuff after Jesus was born. But sure enough, in 1 Corinthians 6:9 it was confirmed: “Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders … will inherit the Kingdom of God.”Later I came to 1 Corinthians 11:3, which said, “The husband is supreme over his wife.” Now growing up, it had never seemed to me that my father had any kind of supremacy over my mother. My mother and father were more like a partnership and in the end, I think my mother might have had a little more pull. This made more sense to me. It didn’t seem like a woman should have to give in to the will of her husband after she gets married.Maybe the Bible was right. Just a few lines later in 1 Corinthians 11:7, it explained the reasons women had to cover their heads when praying in public while men did not have to. It read, “A man has no need to cover his head, because he reflects the image and glory of God. But woman reflects the glory of man. Nor was man created for woman’s sake, but woman was created for man’s sake.” Considering this, it only makes sense that a husband is supreme over his wife. After all, she was created for his sake.As I got into 1 Timmy 2:11, it read, “Women should learn in silence and all humility. I do not allow them to teach or to have authority over men; they must keep quiet for Adam was created first, and then Eve. And it was not Adam who was deceived; It was the woman (they are kind of ditzy) who was deceived and broke god’s Law. But a woman will be saved through having children (I knew that was all they were good for), if she perseveres in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.” That was that, from then on I knew my mother better start thanking me on a daily basis. After all, if it wasn’t for me she wouldn’t be saved.I remember sitting in mass and feeling very strange when they held that book high and said, “This is the word of God.” I discussed the matter once with one of the priests in our parish. He told me that certain parts of the book are outdated and different Christian sects interpret it differently. It still didn’t make sense to me.It seemed to me that at omniscient God would inspire scripture for all ages. I can’t believe God would inspire writings like these in any time period. I asked him if I needed to believe this was the word of God in order to be Christian. He said I did. It was on that day that I decided it was time to look for God elsewhere. If it meant that I would have to accept the Bible as being the word of God, I knew I could not be Christian.
Andrew Hall is a senior electrical engineering major from Fremont, Ohio.