"He’s off watching a supernova, Pete. He’s had it planned since the beginning and wanted to watch it go off."
"Man, you’d think that the ‘Big Bang’ would’ve been enough."
"Naw. He likes things that go ‘boom.’ He’s even imbedded the feeling into the male of every intelligent species He’s ever created."
"Yeah but, if He’s not careful, He could put His eye out."
"He doesn’t have eyes."
"You know what I mean."
"What can I do for you, Pete?"
"I need to talk with Him. When do you expect Him back? Couple of days?"
"What the heck’s a day?"
"You know. Measure of time. Twenty-four hours. One seventh of a week."
"Pete, I wouldn’t know a day from a daze. I’ve been up here helping sort things out since the beginning. Let’s see, you’re from Earth, right? Small planet? Milky Way galaxy? Kind of blue from a distance?"
"Yeah, that’s the one."
"OK, I see what a ‘day’ is, but time’s a bit different up here. We don’t really pay much attention to it. I’d guess the whole shebang’s a couple of billion years old now by your way of reckoning. Anyway, He should be back…wait, here He is now"
"Gabe, you should’ve seen that one. Lit up an entire galaxy. Probably would’ve put My eye out if I had one. Hey, Pete. How are things at the Pearly Gates?"
"Pretty good, but I need to talk with You about an argument they’re having on my old planet."
"That’d be earth right? Kind of a rough bunch inhabiting it. Flooded the place once for bad behavior if I remember correctly.
"Yeah, but You promised not to do it again."
"Been tempted though. I had a couple of books written in different languages to tell you what I expected. Sent some stone tablets too. Lot of good it did. So what’s it this time, Pete? If you’re messing with baseball again, I swear I’m going to move Judgment Day up. I invent the perfect game and you hang the designated hitter rule on it. No offense, Pete, but there’ve been times when I wonder if I did the right thing by wiping out the dinosaurs."
"They’re having an argument about how You designed us. One side’s behind evolution and the other hangs its hat on Intelligent Design."
"Well, I guarantee I designed life and, trust me, you don’t do that without being intelligent. But just because I did it doesn’t mean I’m going to make it easy to understand."
"Huh?"
"How long did it take, after I showed you fire, to figure out how to start one yourselves?
"Uhh…"
"Took you even longer to figure out electricity, weather, tides, germs, and whole bunch of other stuff. How long did you believe that the earth was flat, a couple of thousand of your years old, and that the universe revolved around it?" Guys like Newton and Copernicus finally figured out gravity and planetary motion and whatnot, but they took a lot of guff from some who thought they were being disrespectful to Me just for understanding what I’d done."
"Yeah, well…"
"Listen, I put a lot of time and thought into life. The ins and outs of how you came to be aren’t going to be as obvious as you’d like. I left a ton of clues, but what with a couple of billion of your years having passed since I started everything, there’s a lot of stuff you haven’t even thought of yet, let alone found."
"OK, but…"
"No buts, Pete. Life’s a giant jigsaw puzzle. I gave you science to help put it together. You’re on the right track. Just stubborn it out. Religion is to keep your faith in Me going, let you know what I expect as regards behavior, and reassure you that I’m here to help you through the tough times. The two are supposed to help each other. What do I have to do to get you to understand that?"
"So, in a sense, there is Intelligent Design?"
"Well, there’s intelligence and there’s design. Crack a book on celestial mechanics and try selling the notion there isn’t."
"Right."
"Instead of arguing about it, though, your compatriots on earth might try understanding some other things right away."
"Like what?"
"Like that I did color and races for variety. Not a whit of real difference in the lot of you. About time the folks down there got that one through their thick heads."
"Got it."
"And Pete."
"Yeah?"
"When he gets here, tell the guy who came up with the designated hitter rule that I want to see him immediately."
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