OLD MEN IN BLACK SKIRTS

OLD MEN IN BLACK SKIRTS

An anti-religious poem

By ROBERT DAVIDSON

I saw a sign outside a church
Saying ..God forgives and so do we..
As pious preachers put themselves on par with God
And swathed in stark garments they frown
Telling me to witness -
Standing between me and God

The Church is the voice of God!
But impious Pius XII - Pilate-like refused to protest
Or intervene
And so such wholesale holocaust - diabolism
When the Deputy of Christ is mute

Man invents God -
Pays parson and priest to keep up imposture
With black robes flowing
To become witch-burners in Salem
Rigorous in righteousness, ravagers of reason
Savaronolas and Torqumadas - terrible in Holy Office

No inkpot could drive those devils off!

A protestant padre preaches love and peace
But catches his foot in the hem of his cassock
..Cause his words are at my throat like a pariah dog
I am told I must trust - justify by faith alone
Accept that God moves in most mysterious ways
And believe - I am too afraid not to believe!

In the God business they do God’s work with a gun ..
But no matter truth will out
The Devil’s in me, I’ll burn in front of Jesus

Fear of God - the beginning of wisdom?
I falter in faith -
Fear only fixes the fanaticism further!

Copyright  2006 robertdavidson

NOTES

Pope Pius XII 1876-1958 - failed to speak out against the Nazis in WWII.

Girolamo Savaronola !452-1498 - ruled Florence ruthlessly putting down all luxury and frivolity.

Tomaso Torqumada 1430-1498 - created the Holy Office of the Inquisition. Thousands of heretics were burned at the stake.

Martin Luther 1483-1546 - once threw his inkpot at the Devil

 

Reviews

[raining]

of course......you have to believe in God to be angry at God... kind of a catch 22...

anyways, i well liked your writing. there is somewhat an amount of general genius involved, with the same arguments back and forth that my son and I throw at each other. ...so, as a poem it is a good poem. you don't flower it up and ...we can certainly be anti religious...I am anti religious, and at the same time look (thomas merton, st thomas Aquinus, the desert fathers) at a few men and women who are digging deep into the universe and sheving the wool without damaging the sheep, or something like that.

good though, and I would like to read more of your poems.