God Deserves Better

I concede that I'm a relatively lazy guy. Sure, I'd chalk it up to my advanced age, but to be perfectly honest, I've always been one to try to avoid or minimize work as a default condition.

That is despite the fact that, at 75, I'm still fully, gainfully employed, and I do a lot of things around the house as weekly chores without complaint. I'm talking about my basic tendency, which is toward doing the least amount while still doing a good job.

Looking at today's younger folks, the "Gen Z" types, I certainly see a lot of that. And maybe that explains the point of today's piece.

I'm talking about God.

The Lord himself appears for some reason to be becoming the victim of what I would call "capital punishment", but not in the normal sense of the phrase.

No, I'm referring to the way He is being spelled. 

The Bible has been printed in movable type since the 15th Century, when Johannes Gutenberg invented the process and revolutionized printing. His Bibles were in Latin, of course, which has its own rules for capitalization.

But since long, long ago, the style of capitalizing His name and pronouns to distinguish and respect references to Him has been the standard.

Until now.

I don't get it. Maybe it takes a lot of effort to get off one's backside, grab a vacuum and clean the floors, or make the bed, or do the laundry. Surely it is an effort to get through one's workday, no matter what the profession may be.

But it certainly is not a lot of effort to hold down the shift key on a keyboard and capitalize "God." It bugs the living crap out of me that people -- younger, mostly -- are so lazy that they can't exert themselves a couple ergs worth, to capitalize His name.  It's "Thank God", folks. With a capital "G."

And it's not just the disrespect shown to the Lord when His name is not capitalized. The term "god", as in without the capitalization, has meaning as well.

The use of the lower-case "god" refers to pagan deities -- Greek and Roman gods, for example, in multiple-deity pagan faiths. It also is used when we're referring to, let's say, non-divine situations -- "So-and-so is the god of high-school football in Jones County."

There are gods, and there is God. It's not that hard. I'm a lazy guy, but it would never occur to me not to do so.

Hold down the shift key. I guarantee you He will appreciate the respect. 

Copyright 2026 by Robert Sutton.  Like what you read here? There are over 1,000 posts from Bob at www.uberthoughtsUSA.com and, after four years of writing a new one daily, he still posts thoughts once in a while as "visiting columns", no longer the "prolific essayist" he was through 2018, but still around. Appearance, advertising, sponsorship and interview inquiries cheerfully welcomed at bsutton@alum.mit.edu or on Twitter at @rmosutton.