Santa for adults

I'm going to start this post out by saying that I consider myself to be agnostic. I did the whole Jesus freak thing for many years. The lingo and culture of the Christian church in America is border line cultish. There are so many catch phrases that you have to learn to fit in, like: "It's just God's Will" or "Sometimes NO is an answer". What?!? How is it acceptable to explain such import events away with such vagaries? I prayed on my knees for hours, I begged for help in certain situations, I donated 10's of thousands of dollars to the church, I built rooms for Sunday school, I play hundreds of hours of guitar in the church band, it goes without saying I was immersed in American Christian culture. What conclusion did I come to? In my personal experience, I think most of the "God moments" I thought experienced were just my brain trying to justify my beliefs. Some of our best friends ever were active church members. There are a lot of good hearted people in the church, but there are just as many fakes. Everyone goes to church on Sunday dressed to the 9's, make up perfect, brand new j-crew outfit, smiling wide with their Bibles in hand. If you spent the morning just watching people come, go, and interact with each other in the atrium, you'd think they were all smoking weed in the parking lot. It's kind of sickening. If you spend any time reading the New Testament, you realize that these people who are trying to "do what Jesus would have done" are actually doing the complete opposite. It's interesting to me that the right wing is pro war; when Jesus's motto was turn the other cheek. The right wing also pro-death penalty, when Jesus interrupted a stoning and asked those without sin to cast the first stone. Jesus gave people free healthcare and fed hundred with fish and bread. Jesus turned water into wine and some Christians look at alcohol like its piss from the devil himself. When you read the New Testament, it seems that Jesus was more like a hippy with superpowers than that of a modern day protestant. But what I originally meant to do is make a comparison. 86% of four year old Americans believe in Santa Claus and 90% of adult Americans believe in a God. Both God and Santa Claus are old white guys, having beautiful flowing beards, reward you for good behavior, and have droves up subjugates that carry out their dirty work. Will death be a moment much like when found out there was no Santa Claus? I'm not saying that doesn't mean there isn't an afterlife, but maybe God set everything up and then moved on. The more I see in this world, the more it looks like God created everything, set it in motion, and then said "Good luck with that!!". Perhaps he did the same thing with the afterlife? Maybe he left the afterlife to trusted stewards and went to do more important things. Are we arrogant to think that we could possibly the sole focus of an everlasting deity’s love and affection? Only time will tell.