5 Reasons Why I Support Pope Francis to Change the Lord's Prayer.

Pope Francis: I shall not worship an evil God.

I have always been perturbed by the idea of worshiping God when he endorses murder, violence, rape, plunder and even prejudice. Little wonder therefore that I was excited when Pope Francis stepped on religious toes by faulting The Perfect Prayer of Christians and calling for it to be changed. 

The pope last year revealed in an interview with an Italian media house, TV2000, that the English wording, “Do not lead us into temptation”, in the Lord’s Prayer as it is more commonly known, is a mistranslation of the original words of God’s holy son Jesus when he taught his disciples how to pray.

Pope Francis stated that God does not cause us to sin, as the words suggest, explaining that “this is Satan’s department”. He believes that when we pray, we should petition God to protect us from falling into sin by Satan’s temptation. He therefore suggested the words, “Do not let us fall into temptation” which have already been adopted in the French liturgy to replace the misleading words.

A debate has ensued, in the interest of defending and preserving original scripture on one side, and challenging the inerrancy of the Bible on the other. To very many conservative Christians, the idea of altering the Bible is abominable and many have even questioned the depth of the pope’s theology. Nonetheless, the following are my reasons why I believe the pope should be supported to change the Lord's prayer.

1. I shall not worship an evil God!

Evil behavior is when you sin against other people and includes murder, theft, adultery, and a host of other wicked acts. Essentially, it is a lack of goodness. I shall not worship a god who creates evil, behaves in an evil manner and blesses evil. I shall not worship such a god who is fiercely brutal and destructive when angry.

In the Book of Genesis, a story is told when all the men of the city of Sodom gathered and attacked Lot's home with the intention of gang-raping two male angels that he had hosted that evening. Even though their heinous and inhospitable plot was averted, God unleashed missiles of burning sulphur on Sodom and Gomorrah after evacuating Lot and his family, destroying all the people and vegetation on the land.

Evil Deed: God launches missiles of burning sulphur on Sodom and Gomorrah.

Also in the Book of Joshua 10, God participates in mass murder by hurling large hailstones at the already defeated and retreating enemies of the Israelites at Gibeon. That day, on Joshua's command, God stopped the sun from setting for an extra full day so that Joshua could completely annihilate his enemies. 

In the Book of Exodus 32, God commands the army of Israel to mercilessly murder their own brothers, companions, neighbors and sons in their camp. Because they obeyed his command, God set them apart and blessed them that day. There are numerous other incidences where God creates, actively participates and blesses evil deeds but we can talk about these another day.

I worship a God of love and peace – a God who desires me to love him with all my might and also to love my neighbors as I love myself. I do not worship a God who endorses murder, violence, rape, plunder and even prejudice. Like Pope Francis, I shall not worship a God such as this who is evil.

2. We should dare to address the contradiction of an evil God.

Besides the incidences cited earlier, which clearly demonstrate that God can lead man to evil, there are also contradicting incidences in the Bible which confuse us on who actually is responsible for our evil actions. Take for example the story of David conducting a census of the fighting men of Israel. This story is narrated in 1 Chronicles 21, and again in 2 Samuel 24. Both stories are consistent that David instructed Joab to “Go number Israel and Judah”.

Now, we know that Israel did not belong to David and it was sinful to count what you did not own. For this reason, God unleashed a plague on Israel. And yet, a glaring contradiction of who led David to sin cannot be missed when the two stories are juxtaposed.

Contradiction: Is God interchangeable with Satan?

Satan incited David in the story narrated in book of Chronicles and yet it was God himself in the story that is recounted in the book of Samuel. And the questions arise: Is God interchangeable with Satan? Are they one and the same? Is mistranslation of original scripture an absolute impossibility? Can this contradiction also be explained away by the science of speculative and ambiguous contextualization? 

We should dare to paraphrase the Lord's prayer to redeem any instance in which God is perceived as the motivator of sin. But again, if that God is indeed the motivator of sin, I shall not worship him.

3. Christians are in a phase of denial!

A person in denial is one who is faced with a fact that is too uncomfortable to accept and rejects it instead, insisting it is not true even in a sea of overwhelming evidence.

The fact is that the Bible is evidently clear on its depiction of the evil nature of God and yet sin is perceived as the as the sole mission of Satan working against God’s divine purpose for humanity.

Unfortunately, unlike Pope Francis, many Christians - including religious archetypes and bible scholars, are repressive and conservatively blind to such ambiguities and contradictions. They act deaf when rational or progressive voices debunk their speculative, inconsistent and ambiguous contextualization.

Thankfully, denial is an expected and necessary stage on the journey to acceptance of reality. As a typical stage, it provides a sense of hope for the evolution of theology and spiritual adaptation. For posterity, Pope Francis has my back!

4. Raise conscience about prejudice that is against humanity.

When Christians begin to deal with understanding and accepting contextual ambiguities and contradictions about God’s role in sin management, it will open their conscience to other instances where religious prejudice contradicts with ideals of modern humanity.

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) individuals, for example, have suffered religious ostracization for centuries based on a set of what have been referred to as “clobber passages” in the Bible. Success in paraphrasing the contentious words in the Lord’s Prayer to align contemporary divine perceptions with cherished human ideals will stimulate Christians to reflect on the pope’s other controversial divine cautions such as the one he revealed on the issue of gays:

"If someone is gay and searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?" 

Although these words by Pope Francis caused flutters when he said them in 2013, they have begun to change the church, which has become less caustic to LGBT individuals. 

Generally, there has been significant global movement where many nations are making progress towards acceptance and inclusiveness of these sexual minorities to the point of (sometimes) encouraging same-sex civil unions. However, the density of intolerance remains highest in conservative Christian and Islamic nations. 

  

5. To save the death of traditional Christianity!

The sad truth is that traditional Christianity, particularly the Roman Catholic church, the biggest of the mainline denominations, continues to suffer a large number of adherents in the developed world abandoning it to agnosticism and atheism! The faith is not motivating adherents or producing relevant change. Neither can it explain life’s biggest spiritual questions, and yet it holds a multitude of unresolved contradictions - some conflicting with human ideals, which are not in tandem with new knowledge.

Although Christianity is still able to post high growth rates largely on account of high fertility rates and conversions, notably in sub-Saharan Africa where its future lies, the inability to satisfy these spiritual voids is causing a rapid dwindling of the faith in the liberal developed world.

A 2015 Pew Research Center study revealed that, on average in the US and UK, the percentage of people without a religious preference doubles every decade! At this rate, Christianity will cease to have any authority and influence on the global scene in the next 50 years!

The pope should therefore be supported to stimulate the evolution of theology and avert the effect of the increasing irrelevance of traditional Christianity to humanity. Presently, Pentecostal churches, not being under a central governance system, remain a safe haven. They have the freedom to elect the portions of scripture they deem relevant to their faith system, and have already largely excluded the Lord’s Prayer in their lifestyle.

We may never be able to assess the cumulative impact of wrongly petitioning to God through the Lord's prayer, while accusing him of being evil for the span of life that Christians have recited that prayer, but better late than never. So Pope Francis, who the Roman Catholic church members believe is Saint Peter’s apostolic successor, and therefore holds the keys to heaven, should be supported to change the Lord’s Prayer for Christianity’s sake, if for no other reason. 

Meanwhile this blogger in support of Pope Francis has decided he will not “worship a God who induces temptation” and has terminated the use of this prayer, and has updated his faith system accordingly.

Over to you, what do you say?