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My family history is probably the best way to start you through this book. Religion has been the basis of so many family decisions that have affected my life even before I was born. Mom and dad came together and there was an older brother waiting for me. My mother came from a staunch Catholic family, and my father came from a Wesleyan Methodist family. Due to these rigid beliefs, there must have been an extreme burden for the parents of my mom and dad. As young as I was at the time, I felt the feelings of hatred that were “boiling” close to the surface. The following was told to me many years later that there had been a letter that was sent from one grandmother to the other. Now the chemistry of love was far superior to the doctrine of religion and my mother became pregnant with my older brother. The details are a bit sketchy for me but I know that my mom had to go away to have the baby, as it would have been a disgrace to become pregnant in those days without a proper marriage. Through some arrangement made back in those days my older brother spent about six years of his childhood with my grandparents on dad’s side. My earliest memories were without my older brother, but he became known to me when I was about four years old. We moved into another house and my brother just seemed to appear on the scene. He was my friend for the next ten or twelve years. He was killed in a car accident about1954. This was the point of no return for my mother. She became so guilt ridden that she never recovered from his death.

“God took my son because we were not married when I gave birth to him!” These were the words she told me a few years after his death.

One of the priests told her that God punishes people for sinning; therefore, my brother was taken. My brother’s life was gone and my mother was never to regain a normal life. One day we drove around the town where my brother had been living and she asked the people if he had attended church and if he was in the “state of grace”, which is a term used to say that you would get into Heaven at death. Religion ruled our lives and our deaths and I believe it became a weapon.

There was another incident at this time concerning a boy that would become a friend to me. He was unable to do anything for himself as he had the disease called cerebral palsy. Whenever I was visiting my grandmother, I would go and visit with my friend. He was so happy that he writhed out with joy and squirmed around displaying in the only way he could that he was my friend. Why did God do such a terrible act? The act of having a child with such a disabling disease was an act of God. Not long after this the mother of that boy left the Catholic Church and married a Protestant. What do you expect? The priest said that this is how God punishes a person that has sinned. The parents of that boy were burdened with the responsibility of looking after a disabled person and then to top it off they inherited the curse of the church. Their children were not Catholic so I was not allowed to play with them. It is

this very example of how the powerful position a religion has over its parishioners that I write this book.

I know that I will bring on harsh remarks and make an enemy or two by taking a stance against an established religion, and hopefully a few friends who will be joining me in agreement. And I know that I will be making these enemies because it is the truth that I am writing. I am angry, but not at people anymore but at the powers and principles used to control the minds of people. Mind control is the tool used to this very day. Fear is the next greatest tool of control and guilt all combined to take complete control over the lives of people. For two thousand years religions of one kind or another have ruled us. After this length of time the track record of religion shows its bloody colors. I, for one, refuse to let religion control me. I have found their doctrines have many holes in it. To get people thinking is what I want. To somehow have a thought or two of their very own is my purpose. So if I grind some teeth and boil some blood, I hope in the end that it will do some good.