Two men recently came to campus preaching “the word of God” to all who would listen. One held a sign that read, “Jesus saves us from Hell,” and “Fear God.” This man claimed to be an ambassador of God sent here to warn us that homosexuals, among others, are going to hell along with those who don’t accept Christ.

The other sang homophobic songs when he wasn’t talking to others. I debated with the guy with the sign one-on-one for about an hour and then came back from class to see a larger audience.

This guy and his “reformed homosexual” friend were spouting hate, extreme ignorance and fanaticism. I asked the man with the signs if Native Americans or any other ancient people who lived without hearing of Christ were in hell.

“Yes, because they are sinners,” he said. I asked how they could be in hell because they didn’t know about God or Christ, and said that didn’t sound like God to me.”They had the knowledge of God, through Noah (because we apparently all descended from him), but rejected it.”

I pointed out that if we all descended from Noah, then his family committed incest to repopulate the world, and asked him if that was a sin.

“God allowed incest for Noah’s family, but prohibited it afterwards,” he said.

How convenient. Not only did he fail to come up with concrete answers to my basic questions, but everything he said was 100 percent subjective to his own interpretation of the Bible in addition to being contradictory and hypocritical. Even more ridiculous was when one of them claimed that Christians are the most persecuted and vilified group in history.

Really? I could make a real good case for the Jews (Nazi extermination ?” about six million, the Crusades ?” who knows how many died at the hands of the Christians? ?” Muslims were also slaughtered, even many Jews were blamed for the Black Plague and were killed again by Christians).

Christians have blamed Jews for the death of Jesus for centuries. A Muslim student agreed with me when I told the guy that Jews have been treated far worse throughout history.

The shouting, sign-holding guy told me that all other beliefs, gods and religions are false after I asked him about them. When I asked why, he replied, “God is the right one because it is written in the Bible.”

I asked a woman who identified herself as a Christian if Buddhists were wrong and worshipping false deities, and she said, “Yes.” Again, I asked why, and she said, “Because the Bible says that God is the only God.” Interestingly enough, she said she didn’t think they were going to hell.

So they are wrong, but they are not going to hell? It seems to me that all these people’s messages are flawed, contradictory and hypocritical.

I was not accepted to Sacramento State because God or Jesus willed it. It was because I met the entrance requirements. And don’t tell me that it was Jesus but I don’t realize it. A Catholic woman at the demonstration told me that one can’t depend on people, only on God.

Sure, it’s easy to explain everything away using some invisible figure by claiming that “It is His will.” People don’t die because God calls them; they die because of accidents, diseases, etc.

I have always been tolerant of religious views. I would never hold up a sign claiming that God doesn’t exist and that religious people are wasting their time, yet these “people of God,” at least the sane ones at the demonstration, were all talking down to nonreligious people there, saying that other religions are false, their Bible and God are real, etc. How pompous and arrogant can you get? It was like they were patting people on the head and saying, “Poor soul, you’ll get it someday.”

I guess the best way to get people to follow you and your ideas is through their hearts, not their minds. If you give people something to believe in that cannot be proven, but cannot be disproved, then they and their message can never be truly wrong.

They can just hold up a book and say, “It is true because it is true.” If the Bible said that two plus two equals dish soap, they would claim it is true.

I have never heard someone say they believed everything that a textbook told them, which was probably written by someone with a Ph. D. or an expert in his or her field. The Bible was written by whom?

By men? Men with God’s mandate? All I know is that it is a bunch of myths written to scare people into following. I’ve run out of patience for religion that preaches tolerance, yet practices condescension, intolerance, bigotry and brainwashing.

So what separates all those ignorant zealots fueled by religious fervor from all those who were saying they are Christians too? Maybe they don’t stand on campuses with signs screaming that everyone who does not “know Christ” is going to hell. But they sure as hell think it.

I understand religion is important to many people, but so are my beliefs and others’ who don’t associate with religion or religious texts. Please be tolerant of those who think differently from you. I know Jesus and Mohammad were real people who cared about their fellow man and woman and the problems they faced at the time. The problem is that people have so distorted their messages to suit their own damn needs that we live in a world full of preachers and zealots and no tolerance or practicality.

Scott Allen can be reached at [email protected]