Darrow, Theistica -- Kenny Smallwood is a six-year-old boy who likes playing with toy cars, watching cartoons on television, and reading stories. He is also at the center of a growing crisis threatening to shatter the religious community in this small Theistican town.
Kenny refuses to believe in God.
His skepticism first surfaced three weeks ago, when his Sunday school teacher, Miss Maxwell, introduced her class to the biblical story of creation.
Who Made God?
"Kenny kept asking me questions. If God made the whole world, who made God? I told him that God wasn't made, that he was always there. But he kept asking. Why wasn't the world always there? I said that everything needs to be made, and God made the world. He wouldn't stop. Who made God? Over and over. Who made God? It was horrible!"
Kenny's classmates went home and asked their parents who made God. Andreas Schuler was furious when his daughter demanded an answer. "How the hell should I know? That's why I take Tasha to Sunday school. They're supposed to teach her all those things to believe. It's not my job to think about it, godammit!"
Schuler and other parents stopped taking their children to Sunday school, and many stopped attending services altogether. Most claimed the move was due to the inability of religious dogma to answer a child's simple question. As one put it, "If six-year-old Kenny Smallwood could poke holes in their mumbo-jumbo, why should I attend?"
Other parents admitted that they had harbored doubts for a long time. Now that there was a Sunday morning social scene outside of church, they had no reason to endure the self-righteous moral chastisement any longer.
Joe and Martha Smallwood, however, returned with their son. "Kenny just needs some guidance," Martha explained. One week after the "incident," as it had become known, their minister looked out at his dwindled congregation and invited Kenny for a one-on-one chat. Joe insisted on accompanying his son, to make sure his pants stayed on.
The minister told Kenny that if he was a good boy, believed in God, and followed the Bible, he would go to a nice place called Heaven. But if he didn't believe properly, he would go to bad place called Hell and be punished by burning forever. Kenny burst into tears. "I'm a good boy! I only want to know who made God!"
"Some questions shouldn't be asked," the minister said.
Joe picked up his bawling son and angrily left the church, swearing never to return. "I'm proud of Kenny, and I love him. I won't tolerate having him threatened with eternal damnation. That's nothing less than child abuse."
Meteors and Demons
News of the heretic child quickly spread. Church attendance dropped dramatically. Religious leaders were appalled at the development and mobilized what remained of their flocks.
"I would warn Theistica that you're right in the way of some serious hurricanes," cautioned Pat Robertson, host of "The 700 Club," the Christian Broadcasting Network talk show. "Like Orlando before you, defying God will bring about terrorist bombs, earthquakes, tornadoes, and possibly a meteor."
Other theologians used the Demon Possession Handbook to scientifically determine that Kenny and others were under the influence of an evil supernatural power: "A born-again (and Spirit-filled) Christian can discern the presence of demons in a human by using a technique which has been used by physicians for centuries: a study of the presence of symptoms."
According to the Handbook, "Assuming that their minimum speed of travel is the speed of electricity, 186,000 miles per second, a single demon can trouble a large number of people in the course of a few minutes. This is like a computer is able to work with a large number of customers, through time-sharing."
Hoping to stave of a divine meteor by engaging in spiritual warfare, a mob gathered outside the Smallwood residence, erected a mock gallows, and hanged a large doll while singing songs of love and joy. Joe and Martha looked out their window at the effigy and were incensed. Martha exclaimed, "Oh my God! They killed Kenny!"
"You bastards!"
