One for the Win Column

I have some good news to report. As you may or may not know, I'm a member of the Abimelech Society. You can read more about them here. We are dedicated to the legal removal of religious materials from the public sphere. In other words, if someone offers us a tract, we ask how many we can have, take them all and then round-file them. Those Gideon bibles at hotels; gone! Prayer meeting announcements on the grocery store pin-board; removed. Etc., etc., etc., ad nauseum because it always comes back.

Until yesterday......

Here's the story. I routinely travel from my home town to a city about 45 miles away for work a couple of times a week. Along the highway, there are two rest stops, one south bound, one north bound. One day last year I stopped to use the facilities and while there, looked around for the type of offensive material that the Abimelechs find offensive.

To my amazement, there wasn't just a tract or a flier but an entire paper box filled with religious material. You know those boxes at the rest sites that offer hotel discounts, free truckers magazines, etc? It was one of those chock-a-block full of material. It was all free of course because if there was anything worth reading, they would have charged for it.

Well, it seemed wrong to me that a particular religious viewpoint would be presented at a State funded rest stop. It gives the impression the State is funding or advocating this particular perspective. There were no signs or disclaimers saying this materials was in no way associated with my State's government.

So what to do? I of course did what any good Abimelech would do, I took it ALL and threw it away. This became my routine twice a week. Stop at rest stop, check for new material, throw it away.

At first, the boxes weren't refilled too regularly. I guess those who placed the material new the schedule and how often the boxes needed to be refilled. I imagine the joy they must have felt at the sudden resurgence of religious belief, the hunger for God's word as they found they needed to re-fill the boxes more and more frequently.

I began to doubt myself and my work because it seemed they had an endless supply of this stuff. But, still, I soldiered on as did they.

I can only assume at some point it started to get expensive for them and the heady glow once felt must have started to lose some of it's shine. Of course, I don't know for sure when the feeling started to settle in on them. I can only speculate but suddenly one day, one glorious day, the boxes had disappeared. After months of finding the boxes refilled and refilled at more and more frequent intervals, they disappeared from not only the south bound rest stop but the north bound one as well.

It's been a good two months since they disappeared and still they're gone even to this day. I know, because I continue to stop and check twice a week. I keep up my vigilance because I know this stuff always comes back.

As do I and the other Abimelechs.