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When we take the poetry of scripture and read it like it were a logical treatise by Aristotle, we cannot help but miss the point.The symbol “God” is not meant to be understood logically but to be felt viscerally. The word is a poetic attempt to speak of that which is deeper and larger than we can possibly grasp intellectually. The symbol “God” is a poetic attempt to share in the mystery undergirding us.The symbol “God” is an attempt to share those moments when we are struck by an awe we cannot describe. The symbol can refer to a sense of being at home in the cosmos, and even of a visceral feeling of being addressed by the universe. But such symbols are the poetry of subjective feelings not literal dogma about objective facts. An Atheist who refuses to use the symbol “God” may actually understand the nature of the symbol better than someone who loses its sense of poetic mystery by using the word in the same concrete sense as a stone. We “take the name in vain” when we try to argue logically about what “God” thinks or wants. Preachers blaspheme when they assume to speak for “God.” There is more piety in not saying the word “God” at all than in using it as some kind of metaphysical furniture.To say “God is love” means we cannot capture the mystery of being philosophically; but, when we love each other, we can sometimes feel a profound sense of a deeper tie binding us to each other, to the web of life, and to the stars.