How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
To lead them in prayer Norm calls on Pastor Dan, a pleasantly weathered man dressed in the same shiny track suit as the coaches. Dear God, prays the reverend in a melodic southern voice, all crushed-velvet vowels and chunky consonants, please help us play to the best of our abilities. To conduct ourselves on the field in a way that fulfills your word and honors our faith. Guide us, lead us, protect us…With his eyes shut tight Billy is thinking of Shroom's comment that the Christian Bible is mostly a compilation of old Sumerian legends, not something he particularly needed to know at the time but which has afforded some solace during these past two weeks of practically nonstop public prayer. America loves to pray, God knows. America prays and prays and prays, it is the land of unchained prayer, and all this ceremonial praying is hard on Billy. He tries, but nothing comes. You close your eyes and bow your head and at the first thee or thine it's like the signal cuts out, not so much as a stray spritz of static comes through. The thought that others might be having the same problem doesn't much help, but awareness that something came before—Sumerians, Hittites, Turkmen, an entire UN of ancient civilizations—that the thee-thine formula might not be the last word?—for some reason he finds comfort in this. (XXL.121)
There's so much to unpack in this quote. First: seriously, Pastor Dan? In what way does football fulfill God's word and honor Christian faith? We're not buying it. Second: on a more serious note, religion is a deeply personal thing, despite all the public prayer Billy's been forced to participate in. Everyone is going to experience religion differently, and if thinking about Sumerians makes the Bible more palatable, then more power to you, Billy.
Quote #8
So what do you believe in? Billy doesn't so much wonder as feel the question thrust upon him. Ha ha, well, okay. Jesus? Sorta. Buddha? Hm. The flag? Sure. How about...reality. Billy decides the war has made of him a rock-solid convert to the Church of What It Is, so let us pray, my fellow Americans, please join me in prayer. Let us pray for the many thousands gone, and those to follow. Let us pray for Lake and his stumps. Pray for A-bort's SAW, that it may never jam in battle. Pray for Cheney, Bush, and Rumsfeld, father, son, and holy ghost, and all the angels of CENTCOM and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Pray that it's really about the oil. Pray for armor for the Humvees. Pray for Shroom, who may or may not have eternal life in heaven but who is most definitely f***ing dead here on planet Earth. (Walk.16)
Maybe Billy should look into Pastafarianism. But seriously, it's not religion exactly that Billy is taking issue with here. He's not against Jesus or Buddha or whatever. What he's against is the abuse of religion, and the way people seem to use their faith as an excuse not to see reality when it's uncomfortable.
Quote #9
Maybe the halftime show is as real as anything; what if some power or potent agency lives in it? Not a show but a means to something, something conferred or invoked. A ceremony. Something religious, so long as "religious" extends to such cold-blooded concepts as mayhem, chance, nature out of control. He feels the pull of a superseding reality that trumps even the experiential truths of a grunt on the ground—the blood on your hands, the burn in your lungs, the stink of your unwashed feet. Merely thinking about it sets off a pounding in his skull, not his headache but a heavier sonar throb deep in the lower brain stem. And very clearly the thought comes to him, that's where it lives. The god in your head, all the gods—is that what's happening here? He's too self-conscious and church-averse to accept a completely straight notion of god, so how about this—chemicals, hormones, needs and drives, whatever is in us that's so supreme and terrifying that we have to call it divine. (Raped.39)
It's amazing to watch Billy vacillate between wanting to be a Christian along the lines of Faison ("Sure, I'm saved. Praise Jesus and all that") and then veering wildly into atheism (as if there is nothing in between). It just makes you wonder what his views on religion will be in time, how they will have changed when he's a little older, a little wiser, a little less traumatized.