I was at the checkout counter at my local organic food store (I was buying beer and yoghurt), and the guy in front of me was having a conversation with the clerk who was checking him out. He said, ``I don't even wear sunglasses any more, because I'm a Christian, and I've decided that God doesn't want me hiding myself behind dark shades.''
So I said, without even looking at him, ``You mean you think God can't see through sunglasses? That really surprises me. I always assumed that God had really excellent vision.''
And the guy who had decided not to wear sunglasses said, ``No, it's not about that. It's because I think...'' and he started getting all flustered, to my surprise, because I hadn't expected him to take my comment seriously. Finally he said, ``This is a joke, right?''
And I answered, ``Yeah, I guess it must be.''
The truth is that I wouldn't have said what I did if I'd realized that this guy was so stupid that he'd actually take what I said seriously. But when I thought about it later, I realized that his attitude had offended me. His assumption that he knew what God thinks, and the assumption that God would really be so concerned about him personally as to judge the little details of his life. It was really an egocentric point of view, I decided.
March, 1995