License Plate

March 29, 2007 By Guest Contributor 11 Comments

So I’m driving downtown today, stuck in traffic. I look at the car in front of me. There’s a bumper sticker on it:

Jesusheart

No big deal, right? It doesn’t bother me. In any other case, I would just go back to singing in the car, hoping no one is looking at me.

But then I look below the sticker and read the license plate:

License

Anyone else see the irony…?

(By the way, I recreated the images above with software. There was no camera with me at the time. Curses!)


[tags]atheist, atheism, Jesus, GODDID, bumper sticker[/tags]

Filed Under: General 11 Comments
  • Prokop

    Blame God?

  • http://www.nullifidian.net/ null

    Oh, that’s class.

  • http://www.conversationattheedge.com/ Helen

    This reminds me – I saw a funny church sign yesterday

    I had my camera but we were driving and we were past it by the time I realized, “hey it would be fun to put a photo of that on my blog”.

  • Karen

    Okay, is it Friday yet? My brain must be fried because this one’s going over my head. “Jesus heart, god did.” Huh.

    Will someone spell out the irony for me?

  • http://www.friendlyatheist.com Hemant

    I thought it was ironic to have GOD DID as the license plate, right next to the handicapped logo.

  • Steelman

    Perhaps the driver prayed for a car so she could get around, and was just saying thanks?

    It wasn’t a Mercedes Benz, was it? (I hope I don’t have to explain that one…)

  • http://hauntologie.blogspot.com Lydia

    Hi, I like your blog, hope you don’t mind my visiting.

    That is pretty funny (now that you’ve pointed out the irony), I don’t really understand what was meant by “GOD DID” in the first place…?

  • http://friendlyatheist.com FriendlyAtheist

    Lydia– Thanks for commenting :)

    To me, the license plate meant something like “God’s will” is an explanation for everything. God did it. GOD DID.

    Which is why the handicapped symbol was particularly ironic.

  • Karen

    Which is why the handicapped symbol was particularly ironic.

    AH, gotcha. Thanks for the explanation. :-)

  • http://www.saintgasoline.com Saint Gasoline

    I thought the irony was that God did Lincoln. The poor guy. I mean, have you seen the size of God’s feet?

  • Tyler

    Though I have plenty of sympathy for this person, and their need for comfort, I find it difficult to feel sympathy for an attitude like this. ‘Praise God, I’m disabled.’ This really bothers me. I hope this doesn’t come off as a rant, but I’ve seen this attitude plenty of times, so I feel I should answer it.

    I am disabled, which is 98% of the reason why I deconverted. Christianity could not coherently explain my experiences growing up with Spina Bifida to me, experiences of physical/mental pain, in a way that was not connected to morality. ‘If you feel pain, you brought it on yourself.’

    But how exactly is physical pain connected to a moral cause? What moral transgression does an infant perform to deserve the physical pain it was born with? Where is the Family Value in being the brunt of schoolyard bullying? Were those experiences some sort of unspared rod to prevent me from being spoiled later in life? One particular bully and I became friends, in fact he became my protector a few years later in middle school. Turns out, no surprise, people were bullying him so he bullied me. That was a lesson in the connection between pain and human relations, and I learned it no thanks to religion.

    Again, though I do understand a person’s need for comfort, I don’t understand the attitude of anyone with a disability who can believe in a benevolent divine creator. Does it truly make one feel better to know God loves the broken people He creates, even though He could have saved everyone including Himself a lot of trouble and made them unbroken to begin with? Are we some sort of absurd ‘example’ in his Plan for others to look to and say “Well if that person can find strength, so can I!”

    How patronizing. Religion is little else than patronizing to the ‘meek’ it supposedly celebrates. In such a situation as physical disability, there are two possible explanations I found:

    1. God Hates the Handicapped. (Just wait until Fred Phelps pickets your funeral!)

    2. Or Else…What happened was just biology, material causes we humans are all subject to. And that is a chance to learn about your body and how it works, or doesn’t as the case may be. And if it is possible that you can have these experiences, it is possible for others to have them at some point too, and it is good to comfort them as we wish to be comforted, using our common experience as a starting point. Common experience is bigger than pain. That is a valuable and positive lesson, and gives one a sense of appreciation for the complexity and fragility of fellow mortal living beings.

    …and ya don’t need religion to realize it! :)